"I've never asked her. Indeed, if you would marry me I shouldn't ask her, I should marry first and ask afterwards." "But do you really mean to marry Ellice?" I asked seriously. "Is he-- well, such a very particular friend?" "He proposed to me a fortnight ago after the Jardines' dance, and I refused him--I always refuse, you know," and she smiled again. She was as gay and merry as usual, yet there was about her face a look of strange anxiety that greatly puzzled me. "Then you've had other offers?" "Of course, but mostly from the undesirables. Oh! you would laugh if you could hear them laying open their hearts, as they call it," she said gaily. "Why does a man call his love his secret--as though he'd committed some awful crime? It is most amusing, I can assure you. Mason and I have some good laughs over it very often." "But you surely don't tell your maid such things?" I said, surprised, but knowing well her hoydenish spirit. "Indeed I do. Mason enjoys the joke just as much as I do." "Ah! Tibbie," I said reproachfully, "you are a sad breaker of men's hearts! By Jove! you are so good-looking that if I didn't know you I, too, should fall in love with you." "Why don't you? That's just what I want. Then we should marry and live happy ever after. It would be so delightful. I'd marry you to-morrow, dear old boy, if you wished," she declared unblushingly. "And regret it the day after," I laughed. "Why, Tibbie, you know how horribly badly off the poor old governor left me--a bare thousand a year when all expenses of Netherdene are paid. The place is an absolute white elephant, shabby, worn out, dilapidated--certainly not the house to take a bride to. I haven't been up there for nearly two years. A cotton-spinner in Oldham rents the shoot, and his cheque is always helpful." "Yes," she remarked thoughtfully, gazing down upon the oak floor, "Netherdene certainly isn't a very cheerful spot. It would make a nice home for incurables, or a lunatic asylum. Why don't you try and form a company, or something in the City, and run it? Other fellows do." "What's the use?" I asked. "I'm no hand at business; I only wish I were. Then I could make money. Now, I only wander about and spend it." "Well, you have a decent time, so what more can you want?" she asked, looking at me with those wonderful eyes that had caused many a man's head to reel. "You ought, after all, to be satisfied, and thank your stars you're not worse off." "You're not satisfied yourself, even though you are one of the most popular girls in town?" I said. "You want a husband." "I shouldn't want one if the mater gave me a decent allowance. I hate to be continually borrowing from Cynthia when the mater has plenty and Jack is throwing it away on the Stock Exchange. He's always learning of good things from his friends, but they generally result in losses."