“What is the use? He will not listen,” she thought, feverishly. “I will let him love me while he is here and when he is gone I will write him very positively that I can not marry him.” Her love and his happy masterful air made a coward of her, and she was willing to put off the fatal declaration, feeling a guilty pleasure in basking in this sunshine to which she had no right, and from which she must soon steal away into the gloom of a life made sad by an unhappy love. For deep down in her heart Molly Trueheart knew already that this mutual love between her and Cecil Laurens was a catastrophe, not a blessing, as he believed it. She knew that she could never marry him, but her feeble declarations to that effect had been silenced by his objections, so she decided to filch from fate a few bitter-sweet hours before she parted forever from this splendid yet forbidden love. Afterward, when the storm-rains of despair beat on her defenseless head, and her heart ached on amid fiercest tortures, Molly looked back on this hour, the beginning of it all, with a great wonder at her weakness and cowardice. Why had she yielded even for an hour to this madness? Why had she let her love make her a craven and a coward? She laid all the blame upon herself in wonder and sorrow and repentance, too ignorant and unversed in the mysteries of life and nature to comprehend that it was not so much her honesty that had been at fault as that through her love her will-power had been dominated by the magnetic force of her lover. For grand, handsome, noble Cecil Laurens, although unconscious of his power, was possessed of a strong magnetism that subtly influenced all with whom he came in contact, and doubly attracted the susceptible girl whom he loved. She did not realize the power of this magnetic will any more than Cecil himself did, yet certainly it was more than half to blame for poor Molly Trueheart’s treachery. CHAPTER XV. All in a minute, as it seemed, he was putting on her first finger the splendid solitaire diamond from his own hand. “Will you wear this for an engagement ring, or shall I buy you a new one?” he asked. “I prefer this because you have worn it,” she answered, frankly, and blushing very much, at which Cecil was delighted. To herself she said, sadly: “That is the truth, but there is another reason still for my preference. I must not put him to the expense of a new ring, for this will do for the few days that I shall be able to keep up the farce of an engagement.” She sat silent, twisting the costly gem uneasily about her finger, when suddenly she saw coming toward her across the lawn Mrs. Barry, attended by Agnes Walker, her maid. The sight roused Molly from the dream of bliss into which she was falling. She pulled the ring from her finger. “Here, take it back; I--I can’t marry you. Don’t tell Aunt Thalia, please,” she faltered, desperately. Cecil took the ring and her hand with it, and pushed the jewel back on the slim, rosy finger.