She nodded.

“Clara is going to marry that Frenchman next month,” she said, “and I shall be looking for another companion.  Do you know of one?”

“I haven’t another niece,” he answered.

“Even if you had,” she said, “I have come to the conclusion that I want something different.  Will you listen to me patiently for a moment?”

“Yes.”

“Will you marry me, please?” she said.  “No, don’t interrupt.  I want there to be no misunderstandings this time.  I don’t care whether you are an invalid or not.  I don’t care whether you are going back into politics or not.  I don’t care whether we live here or in any other corner of the world.  You can call yourself anything, from an anarchist to a Tory—­or be anything.  You can have all your workingmen here to dinner in flannel shirts, if you like, and I’ll play bowls with their wives on the lawn.  Nothing matters but this one thing, Lawrence.  Will you marry me—­and try to care a little?”

“This is absolutely,” Mannering declared, taking her into his arms, “the most brazen proceeding!”

“It’s a good deal better than the bungle we made of it before,” she murmured.

THE END

* * * * * *

E. Phillips Oppenheim’s Novels

A PRINCE OF SINNERS

Thoroughly matured, brilliantly constructed, and convincingly told.—­London Times.

It is rare that so much knowledge of the world, taken as a whole, is set between two covers of a novel.—­Chicago Daily News.

ANNA THE ADVENTURESS

A story of London life that is at once unusual, original, consistent, and delightful.—­Buffalo Express.

An entrancing story which has seldom been surpassed as a study of feminine character and sentiment.—­Outlook, London.

ENOCH STRONE

In no other novel has Mr. Oppenheim created such life-like characters or handled his plot with such admirable force and restraint as in this capital story of the career of masterful Enoch Strone.

A SLEEPING MEMORY

A story in occultism, but with all its mysticism and its dealings with the unknowable the book is never dull, the thread of the human story in it is never lost sight of for a moment.—­Boston Transcript.

MYSTERIOUS MR. SABIN

Emphatically a good story—­strong, bold, original, and admirably told.—­Literature, London.

Intensely readable for the dramatic force with which the story is told, the absolute originality of the underlying creative thought, and the strength of all the men and women who fill the pages.—­Pittsburgh Times.