Katherine saw her coming and smiled. That morning, with quick intuition, she had read the secret in Ronald's heart, and suddenly knew how much she cared for the boy who teased and tormented, but never failed her if she needed him. In her own mind, she had written down Beatrice as an unsparing coquette, and determined to take up the cudgels in behalf of her victim. The girl sewed nervously, breaking her thread frequently, but she kept at it until Katherine said, very gently, "Bee, George cares for you." "I know!" snapped Beatrice. Her thread broke again, and her hands trembled so she could scarcely knot it. "And Robert, too," said Katherine, presently. "I know!" "Well, dear, what are you going to do about it?" "Cousin Kit," said the girl, angrily, "if you're going to lecture me, I'm going back home." She folded up her work, but Mrs. Howard put a restraining hand upon her arm. "Don't, Bee. You know we talked about my trouble together--why can't we talk about yours?" "I haven't any trouble!" Beatrice's face was flushed, but her voice was softer, and she seemed willing to stay. "What are you going to do about it?" asked Katherine, once more. "What can I do about it?" cried Beatrice, in a high key--"why, that's simple, I'm sure! I can go to Mr. Ronald and say, 'Please, Mr. Ronald, don't ask me to marry you, because I'm going to marry Cousin Rob. He doesn't know it yet; in fact, he hasn't even asked me, but I'm going to do it just the same.' Or, I might go to Cousin Rob and say, 'My dear Mr. Forsyth, I hope you won't ask me to marry you, because I'm going to marry Mr. Ronald, who hasn't asked me as yet. In fact," she continued, with her temper rising, "I've about concluded that I won't marry anybody!" "Bee, dear, I'm only trying to help you--please don't be cross to me. Which one do you care for?" "Neither!" cried Beatrice, in a passion. "I don't care for anybody, and I'm never going to be married. I'd be happy, wouldn't I? Tied up--chained like a dog--take what my master gave me--slave--drudge--bear whatever burden he saw fit to put upon me--eat my heart out in loneliness--cry all day and all night for my lost freedom. Marry? Not I!" "Marriage means all those things, as you say," said Katherine, after a silence; "but the bitterest part of it is that, when you find your mate, you have to go. The call is insistent--there is no other way. It means child-bearing and child loss--it means a thousand kinds of pain that you never knew before,--loneliness, doubt, sacrifice, misunderstanding,--and always the fear of change. Before, you think of it as a permanent bond of happiness; later, you see that it is a yoke, borne unequally. You marry to keep love, but sometimes that is the surest way to lose it.