“Certainly she’s engaged to him still. What made you think the match could be broken off when they just dote on each other? Daisie’s been a bit of a flirt, I know, but she’s in dead earnest this time.” “Good evening!” Dallas answered abruptly, turning from her, and stumbling down the steps, like a drunken man, so hardly had he been stricken by the remorseless blow of the woman, who banged the door shut after him, chuckling maliciously: “Guess I paid him out for his meddling with that match I was so set on. ’Twasn’t a story I told, either, for Mr. Sherwood told me he didn’t consider the engagement broken at all, and hoped soon to persuade Daisie to wear his ring. Now I’ve sent that fellow off about his business, I hope, so he won’t interfere any more.” But Dallas, dazed with pain and woe, was making straight for Sea View. All hope was dead in his breast now, for the mere fact of Daisie’s presence at Sea View, as the guest of Royall Sherwood’s cousin, seemed to prove the truth of Mrs. Bell’s assertion. But a dumb longing in his breast made him yearn for a single look at her face again to ease the ache at his heart ere he turned away forever to carry his pain into the heedless throngs of the busy world. “She is only a wretched little flirt, after all, yet she has wrecked my peace of mind, and I cannot thrust her from my memory,” he groaned, as he went on to Sea View, meaning to see Daisie, himself unseen, and then depart forever. As he went into the grounds he saw that the place was brilliantly lighted up, and heard the swell of music blending with the murmur of the sea as the tide rolled in to the shore. “Madam must be holding one of her gay receptions. I wonder what she would say if she knew I was so near?” he muttered, as he dragged himself up the steps and hid on a balcony, where he could peer, unseen, into the room. He saw the brilliant drawing-room gleaming with lights, adorned with flowers, and crowded with guests sitting about as if waiting for something. What? And was not that a wedding march that rose on the air from the screen of plants yonder where the band was hidden? His wandering eyes suddenly discovered a white dais erected at one end of the room, over which swung from broad white ribbons a magnificent floral wedding bell. A bridal party entered the room and advanced toward the dais, on which suddenly appeared a tall, pale young man in clerical garments, with an open book in his hand. Louder and louder rose the strains of the joyous wedding march while Dallas looked on with dazed eyes and a numb pain at his heart, wondering what would happen next. He was not left long in doubt. He saw Mrs. Fleming and Daisie Bell advancing to meet Royall Sherwood and his best man at the altar. Something--a grinning demon--seemed to clutch at the gazer’s heart and stop its beating, for Daisie was the bride--a wedding veil hid the dazzling sheen of her golden hair. CHAPTER XIII. “HER OWN AGAIN.”