“I wish I did.”

“Be patient and you will.  After maintaining friendship true and strong for years, it hurts me to be misjudged now.”

“But, Miss Wildmere—­” he began, impetuously.

“Hush,” she said, hastily; then added, a little coldly, “if I am not worthy of a little trust I am not worthy of anything.”

Graydon was touched to the quick.  Honorable himself, he felt that he was acting meanly and suspiciously—­that his jealousy and irritation were leading him to unmanly conduct.  There was some reason for her course, which would be explained eventually, and he ought not to ask a woman to be his wife at all unless he could trust her.  Therefore he said, humbly.  “I beg your pardon.  In my heart I believe you worthy of all trust.  I will wait and be as patient as you desire, since I know that you cannot have failed to understand me.”  Then he added, with a deprecating laugh, “There are times, I suppose, when all men are a little blind and unreasonable.”

“Heaven keep him blind!” she thought, yet she winced under his honest words in their contrast with herself.

“I hope some day to prove worthy of your trust,” she breathed, softly, and looked in dread into the darkness lest in some way her words should reach Arnault.  “Come, please,” she added, with a gentle pressure on his arm, “let us return, or the hotel may be closed upon us.”

“Please give me all the time you can,” pleaded Graydon, as they paused at the door.

Looking within, she saw Arnault with his back toward them, and said, hastily, and as if impulsively, “I will—­all that I can.  Possibly my regret will be deeper than yours that I cannot give you more.”

“You should know that that is not possible,” he said, in low, earnest tones.  Then he added, in a whisper, as she was entering, “I can trust you now and wait.”

“My good fortune is still in the ascendant,” was her thought; “I can still keep him in hand, in spite of papa and Mr. Arnault.”

“Her father’s relations with Mr. Arnault must give him some hold upon her,” he thought, “and for her father’s sake she cannot yield to me at once, but she will eventually.”

Mr. Arnault came forward with smiling lips, light words, yet resolute eyes.  Graydon felt that he had received all the assurance that he needed—­that she was under some necessity of keeping his rival in good-humor—­so he smiled significantly into her eyes, and bowed himself away.

“Muir looked as if he had received all the comfort that he required,” Arnault said, as they strolled across the parlor, now deserted.

“Did he?  Well, he did not require very much.”

“How much?”

“You had better ask him.”

“Stella,” he said, and there was a suggestion of menace in his tone, “I’m in earnest now.  You will soon have to choose between us.”

“Shall I?” she replied, bending upon him an arch, bewildering smile.  “Then please don’t speak as if I had no choice at all;” and she was going.