“And I, too, hope,” I interrupted.

“Yes,” she continued quickly.  “But do you know I can almost understand the feeble, hopeless resistance which the iron tries to exert against the magnet.  But, cousin Ned, it is powerless.”

Here she brought her handkerchief to her eyes, and I exclaimed regretfully, “Oh, Frances, I am surprised and sorry!”

“Yes, yes!  I, too, was surprised, and was so sorry that I wept through the whole night following my first sight of him, and between shame for what I felt and longing to see him again, I suffered terribly.  I prayed for strength against this, my first temptation, and then my heart shrunk in fear lest I should never again be tempted.  The next day I walked out on the Bourne Path toward Hamilton House and met him.  To my shame I confess that I looked at him.  He stopped, bowed low before me, and asked if he might introduce himself, since there was no one else to do that office for him.  He said that soon Lord St. Albans would be up from London and would introduce him to my father.  But having seen me the day before at St. Albans, he was unable to wait; therefore, he was at that moment on his way to Sundridge, hoping to see me.  He seemed confused and shy, but from what you say, I fear he was not.”

“Oh, yes, he was,” I interrupted, in fine irony.  “George Hamilton is as shy and as modest as the devil himself.”

“I fear it is true,” she answered smiling faintly and sighing.

I could see plainly that she did not look upon satanic modesty as a serious fault in itself, and I fear it is not objectionable to her sex.  It is the manner of brazenness more than the fact which is offensive.  George’s modest-faced boldness was both alluring and dangerous.

As she progressed she grew eager in her narrative, and after two or three false starts, continued:  “Then he said that Count Hamilton, our neighbor, was his brother.  I was silent for a moment, but presently was so foolish as to say that I had seen him at St. Albans and had asked a shopkeeper who he was.  You see I was confused.  I had not at all intended to say that I had seen him, and certainly would have concealed the fact that I had asked about him.  But I said what I said because I could not help it.”

“On that ground it may be excusable,” I suggested.

“No, no,” she protested.  “It can be excused on no grounds.  But I did it, and it can’t be helped now.  Without waiting for permission, he turned, and we walked together almost to Hamilton House.  I suppose, under the circumstances, he considered it best not to ask for a permission which might have been refused, and from his standpoint doubtless he was right.  Take without asking seems to be man’s best method with woman.  When I saw we were approaching Hamilton House, I turned about for home, hoping, yet fearing, that he would not go back with me.  But he did.”

“Yes, you were sure to be disappointed in that respect,” I answered.  And she continued hastily:—­