The green and gold beauty of the morning hurt her with the memory of that other sunny morning, when he had so easily taken from her the task she hated and strove to bear. And he had succeeded, how he had succeeded! Who else in the world could have so transformed Dick? Leaning on the table, her round chin in her palm as she gazed down at the paper in her lap, her fancy slipped back to that night on the Long Island road, when she had first seen his serene genius for setting all things right. How like him that elimination of Dick, instead of a romantic and impracticable attempt to escort her himself. A bush crackled stiffly at some one's passage; a shadow fell across her. "Caught!" laughed Lestrange's glad, exultant voice. "Since you look at the portrait, how shall the original fear to present himself? See, I can match." He held out a card burned at the corners and streaked with dull red, "The first time I saw your writing, and found my own name there." Amazed, Emily sat up, and met in his glowing face all incarnate joy of life and youth. "Oh!" she gasped piteously. "You are surprised that I am here? My dear, my dear, after last night did you think I could be anywhere else?" "The race--" "I know that track too well to need much practise, and I had the machine out at dawn. My partner is busy practising this morning, and I'll be back in a couple of hours. I was afraid," the gray eyes were so gentle in their brilliancy, "I was afraid you might worry, Emily." Serenely he assumed possession of her, and the assumption was very sweet. He had not touched her, yet Emily had the sensation of brutally thrusting him away when she spoke: "How could I do anything else," she asked with desolation, "since we must never meet each other any more? Only, you will not go far away--you will stay where I can sometimes see you as we pass? I--I think I could not bear it to have you go away." "Emily!" The scissors clinked sharply to the floor as she held out her white hands in deprecation of his cry; the tears rushed to her eyes. "You know, you know! I am not free; I am Emily Ffrench. I can not fail my uncle and grieve him as his son did. Oh, I will never marry any one else, and we will hear of each other; I can read in the papers and Dick will tell me of you. It will be something to be so close, down there and up here." "Emily!" "You are not angry? You will not be angry? You know I can do nothing else, please say you know." He came nearer and took both cold little hands in his clasp, bending to her the shining gravity of his regard. "Did you think me such a selfish animal, my dear, that I would have kissed you when I could not claim you?" he asked. "Did you think I could forget you were Emily Ffrench; even by moonlight?" Her fair head fell back, her dark eyes questioned his. "You--mean--"