“It is one of the peaks, at any rate,” said he smiling. “It is high enough for me. Those who cannot get to the summit of Mont Blanc must be content with the humble Monte Rosa. And feeling that your future, my child, is assured, I shall be the more content, if--ah, you are quite right. Good-night--good-night.” She went upstairs feeling that the fight with Fate was over. What would be the use of struggling any longer against what was plainly the decree of Fate? Fate is a tough antagonist at any time, but when Fate and the newspapers are pulling together---- She went to bed without saying her prayers. CHAPTER XXVIII Amber Severn read the announcement in one of the papers the next morning that a marriage was arranged and would shortly take place between Mr. Ernest Clifton, fifth son of the late Constantine Clifton of The Elms, Lynnthorpe, Esq., and Josephine, only daughter of the Right Honourable J. Carew West, Under Secretary of State for the Department of Arbitration. She gave an exclamation of surprise, and this was followed by one that suggested irritation. She was more than irritated, she felt that she had lost a friend--her dearest friend. She had always known that Josephine was somewhat reticent about her own affairs for an ideal friend; but the notion of her being in love with Mr. Clifton and carefully refraining from giving a hint to any one of the state of her heart was past all bearing. And yet she remembered now having had once or twice during the previous six months, a suspicion that if Josephine inclined to look on any man of their acquaintance with especial favour that man was Mr. Clifton. She might have guessed but what about Pierce Winwood? What about her father’s subtle suggestions as to the possibility of Josephine’s looking with eyes of favour on Pierce Winwood? What about that Monday morning when they had come into the house together talking with guilty fluency about a reaping machine that was painted blue and delicately picked out with vermillion? “I will never--never trust to the evidence of my own eyes again,” she cried, remembering the look of exultation on Mr. Winwood’s face upon that morning. She also made up her mind that she would never again in matters of this sort trust to the evidence of her father’s experience, even though conveyed to her in the choicest and most enigmatical language ever employed by him. Her father had shown a desire to encourage the bringing about of a match between Josephine and Pierce; and indeed he had proved his possession of some of the qualities of the fully equipped match-maker, which she took to be a cheery readiness to assume the rôle of a sort of boarding-house Providence, and a complete faith in the influence of propinquity upon opposing natures. She would never again trust to her father’s judgment. He knew too much about electricity.