and brightest crown of a woman’s life—the love of a devoted husband. I have spoken at length, and very plainly, and now I await your verdict. What will you say to me?” he questioned, as he turned his earnest face, his eager eyes upon her. She sat perfectly motionless for a few moments after he concluded, but he could see that her face, though averted, was crimson, while she trembled visibly. Then all at once she lifted her face haughtily and met his glance with a defiant look. “Yes, what shall I say to you?” she cried, in quivering tones. “I wonder that I do not tell you to go and never let me look at your face again; that I do not tell you that I care nothing for that wretched contract—that I hate it, scorn it and you; that I would almost rather die than marry a man who can so coldly tell me that his heart is dead and he has no love to bestow upon me with his hand—who, more than that, can plead so eloquently the cause of another and deprecate his own success. But, oh, Truman Winthrop, I will not—I will not! I shall be your wife in spite of it all! You do not know what I sacrifice in telling you this,” she went on vehemently, and throwing out her hand toward him with a passionate gesture; “how my pride suffers, how my love suffers, how I am violating all the strongest feelings of my nature; but I cannot help it. I have given myself to you and I will not retract; but—I will make you love me yet—you shall yet own to me that your heart is not dead, and that Sadie Rochester is the one love of your life.” She burst into a passion of tears at this point, and, as if able to bear no more, abruptly arose and fled from the room, leaving Dr. Winthrop in no enviable frame of mind. Her passionate denunciation had made him feel as if he had done her a double wrong in stating his own feelings so plainly and in pleading his brother’s cause. But he could not have done otherwise under the circumstances. Truman Winthrop was true to his heart’s core, and he could not allow her to marry him without trying to make her realize the risk she ran of ruining her own life by so doing. Still he felt uncomfortable over having wounded her so deeply; her words, “you do not know what my pride suffers—you do not know what my love suffers,” smote him keenly, and he firmly believed that she could have no affection whatever for his brother. How could he know that what she sacrificed in keeping her pledge to him was the one love of her life—Norman Winthrop? How could he know that her pride suffered in that, having vowed to be his wife, she could not repudiate him and tell him that she scorned and despised him—that she would never marry him but for the wealth and position which she would win as his wife? She had wrought herself into a veritable tempest of passion, and her last threat that she would win his love had been an idle one; for she cared little for his affection, in comparison with the fortunes for which she was scheming.