'I thought you came to stay out the grouse-shooting?' 'Till the tenth of December! I have not been asked,' he replied, gnawing his yellow moustache; and then, after a pause, added, 'would _you_ wish that I stayed?' 'Certainly, if you are enjoying yourself,' was the girl's frank but--after what he had urged some time ago--rather rash response. His eyes sparkled--he drew nearer. 'Miss Raymond--Olive!' he exclaimed, but paused, as, at that moment, Lady Aberfeldie swept into the room; 'on the terrace--the terrace after breakfast,' he whispered, hurriedly, and then turned to receive his hostess's morning greeting, which was so frigid that he feared she had overheard him call her niece by her Christian name. Holcroft was rather abstracted at breakfast; thus Ruby Logan, who had been watching him, said, 'I would not, if I were you, put more sugar on the devilled turkey; it won't improve it.' 'Forgot it was not salt; thanks, Miss Logan,' stammered Holcroft. Now, whether the charming Olive was inspired by coquetry, curiosity, caprice, or a strange desire to play with fire, we know not; but when breakfast was over she laid down a novel she had been reading, or affecting to read, at intervals during the meal, and, assuming her garden hat, with all the laces and ribbons of her bright morning dress fluttering about her, while everyone else at table was deep in his or her letters and papers, went forth upon--the terrace! Now Mr. Hawke Holcroft never read novels or anything else unless for a purpose. He glanced at the page which Olive had left open (the work was 'Miss Forrester') and the passage struck him as most _apropos_ to himself: 'I never pretended to goodness. I have certain views for myself. I never pretended to fooling. I am clever. What stands between me and my ambition I will remove; of whatever can administer to it I will avail myself. Beyond this, it seems to me, I am as good as other people.' 'Hawke, my boy, yourself to a hair!' thought he, as he quietly sought the terrace, not by the French window, as Olive had done, but by going through a corridor and the entrance hall. As coolly as if she had no prevision of what he was sure to urge, Olive, who wore a waggish yet shy expression under her garden hat, and who kept her hands deep in the pockets of her morning dress, said, 'What have you to say to me here that you could not have said in the vicinity of the tea-urn?' 'All that I have to say may be said in three words.' 'Three! say it then.' 'I love you; a confession that has hovered on my timid lips many a time.' 'I cannot listen to this, and I wish to have back my bangle. If Allan were to see it--good heavens!' 'I have said that it shall be buried with me. Do give me some hope.' 'Of what; permission to retain the bangle?' 'No; that you may one day love me.' 'I cannot.' 'Say rather that you will not.'