"Rejoice, yes, that is best--much best," Carmontelle said, after a long, constrained pause. "It is best," he repeated again, more firmly. "It was fate itself that gave her to me," Van Zandt said, solemnly; and in a burst of emotion he made clear the mystery of the wounded arm that had so puzzled his friend. "She was dying, and I gave my own blood to save her life. It is my own life that leaps through her veins, that sends the light to her eyes, the color to her cheek. But it is my secret. She must never know." "No, never; but by that noble sacrifice her life belongs to you, and I can be unselfish enough, Van Zandt, in my own disappointment, to wish that you may win her whole young heart!" Carmontelle exclaimed, lifted out of all selfish regrets by this strange revelation. And then they planned it all out before Van Zandt lay down to rest, taking Marie's consent for granted--Marie, the simple, ignorant girl who could not have told you to save her life what those two words, love and marriage, meant. She was as innocent as a babe over many things, poor Little Nobody! And, to do Van Zandt justice, he revolted at the thought of taking her, as it seemed, willy-nilly; but the world, the great wicked world, left him, as Carmontelle said, no other way. "I should have liked to woo and win my bride in the sweet old fashion," he thought, regretfully; then, with a new idea: "And what is there to hinder? The words of the marriage service will be almost meaningless terms to her untutored mind. I will take no advantage of the claims it will give me. I will hold her as sacred as an angel until I shall win her heart as well as her hand. At home I will place her in the school-room with my sisters. She shall have culture equal to her beauty, and I will work for her and worship her in silence until the child becomes a woman and her heart awakes from sleep." The very next day he said to her gently: "Ma'amselle Marie, I shall be going home to Boston in two more days." She cried out regretfully: "Oh, I am sorry; I am afraid I shall never see you any more!" "Will you go with me, dear, and be my little wife?" "I will go with you, yes; but--your wife--I do not understand," she said, in a puzzled tone, just as he had expected she would. "You would live with me always," he began. "You would belong to me, you would bear my name, you would do as I wished you, perhaps, and--" "Ah, your slave?" she interrupted, intelligently. Serious as he felt, he could not forbear a laugh; but he said, gently: "Not my slave, but my love, my darling, my treasure. I would never beat you, nor scold you, nor make your life sad, as Madame Lorraine did. I would be very kind to you always. Now, will you be my wife?" She replied, with childish frankness: "Yes, I will be your wife and go with you to your home. Then, perhaps, I will understand better your word, 'wife.'"