Then he lost them and went down into a mental gulf. He locked himself in his room, to be ever alone; thoughts came to him that he could not bear: he rose and filled a glass twice with brandy and drained it. He ran his hand through the tumbled light hair that Vesty had so loved, and reeled out of the room with a laugh on his lips and a flush on his face. "Mother, I have lost my girl!" "O Notely! however mistaken I have been, what have I loved, whom have I loved in all this world but you, my child? Do not break my heart!" "No, no, mother!" said Notely, going and standing beside her; "I am your natural--natural--protector." As he stood thus, looking out with his drunken yet bright and tender eyes, the child of her breast whom she had robbed, she laid her head on his shoulder and began to cry. "Why, mother!" he said, almost sobered for the instant. Never had this son seen this mother weep. He led her to a lounge. "I think," he said, struggling for thought very seriously; he racked his stormy, fuddled brain for what would most please her. "Now, when shall we have a wedding, mother? Grace--Grace Langham." "O Notely!" She tried to detain him with her hand. "I'll go--go ask her," he said. He passed out with an easy exaggeration of his usual lordly air, debonair and high, and at the same time genial. Grace was alone in the arbor, in her favorite hammock, with a book, when Notely came up. The look she gave him was full of amusement and anger and disgust. These qualities somehow attracted him now. He was a gentleman; he tried to hold himself very erect against the trellis, and put the question delicately. "Light--light--light of my soul!" he said. Grace threw down her book and screamed. Then she put her hands over her face and fell to crying. Notely took out his handkerchief and wiped his own eyes with the choicest deliberation of sympathy. "All--all seem to be weeping to-day," he said. "Oh, you wretch! you brute! you brute!" cried Grace. Notely, though much flattered, continued diplomatically mopping his eyes. At length he desisted; and Grace, looking out and seeing his keen, handsome profile staring out so desolately, came down from the hammock. She shivered a little; drunken men were horrid, even dangerous. But Notely! She came up heroically and put her hand on his sleeve. "There is one condition, Notely, on which I can--consider your proposal." "Name," said Notely, with touching legal precision, "condition on which you'll marry me." "You must never, never drink like this again. I did not know that you ever did this. Oh, how it has hurt me!" The lace fell back from her white arms, there was a perfume of flowers about her; bright brown eyes are lovelier when suffused with tears. "Thanks!" said Notely, meaning to come up to the full measure of the occasion. "I'm not--not worthy. No--no--no previous engagement, how'ver."