"Oh, no, no! I beg your pardon a hundred times I did not mean it at all. I am sorry for you, old fellow, but I can not understand it, really." "Perhaps you are dull of comprehension. Take a cigar to brighten up your understanding." They light their cigars and walk on together, and then De Vere continues: "What is it about the affair that you can not understand?" "That she should refuse you. I thought she would be sure to accept." "Ah!" said Lieutenant De Vere, dryly, and then he took several moody puffs at his cigar. "Yes, I honestly thought so. Did she give you any reason for refusing you?" "Two reasons," De Vere replied, laconically. "One ought to have been enough," said his friend. "Yes, it ought to have been, I know," said De Vere, reddening warmly. "But, you see, I did not want to take no for an answer, so when she said she couldn't marry me because she didn't love me I wanted her to take time. You see, I thought she might learn to love me. So, then, to escape my importunities, she had to put in another reason." "And that?" asked Lancaster. "I am not sure that I ought to tell. I think she told it me as a secret," he answered, thoughtfully. And then when he saw Lancaster's grave, disappointed face, he said, suddenly: "Tell me your secret, Lancaster, and I will tell you hers. Why did you run away from Lancaster Park?" "Because I was a coward, De Vere--that is all," bitterly. "But why? Were you afraid that your aunt would marry you off willy-nilly to the earl's daughter?" "Not exactly, although there was some danger of it," said Lancaster, smiling. "There was some other reason, then? Come, old fellow, are you ashamed to confess the truth?" "I should have been a week ago, I think I might own it now with the bribe you offered in view." "What was it, then?" curiously. "This: I was madly in love with Leonora West, and too selfish, or too jealous, or too great a coward, to stay and witness your happiness as her accepted lover." "Hum! All the happiness you would have witnessed wouldn't have hurt you," ruefully. "And so you ran away like a coward! What have you been doing all this while, truant?" "All sorts of foolish things, I'm afraid. For one thing, I've been trying to exchange out of my own regiment into one ordered to India." Lieutenant De Vere was betrayed into a whistle of profound surprise: "Whew!" "Yes," admitted the big, handsome fellow, shamefacedly. "But do you mean to tell me that you were going to throw over the whole thing, Lady Lancaster, Lady Adela, and all--just because you were disappointed in love?" queried De Vere, in wonder. "Yes, I believe I was--though I didn't think much about it. You see, I was just running away headlong from my own misery." "I did not really believe you were so romantic," said De Vere, after a long pause. "You mean so foolish," said his friend, eying him closely. "Well, perhaps so," admitted the lieutenant.