“Grateful be hanged!  I don’t want anybody to be grateful.  I want you to love me—­to marry me.  Why, Agatha,” he argued boyishly, his hopes rising as he saw her face soften a little, “you’re mine, for I plucked you out of the sea.  I had to have you.  I guess I knew it that Sunday, only it was ’way off, somewhere in the back of my brain.  You’re a dream I’ve always loved.  Just as this old house is.  You’re the woman I could have prayed for.  I’ll do, I’ll be, anything you wish; I’ll change myself over, but oh, don’t say you won’t have me.  Agatha, Agatha, you don’t know how much you mean to me!”

Before this speech was finished, James, according to the good old fashion, was down on his knees before his lady, and had imprisoned one of her hands.  Stoic she was, not to yield!  Her eyes had a suspicious moistness, as she shook her head.

“You will always be the most gallant, unselfish friend I have ever known.  But—­”

“But—­what?”

“Marry you I can not.”

“Why not?”

“I can not marry anybody.”

Then Jimsy said a disgraceful thing.  “You kissed me once.  Will you do it again?”

At this impudence, she neither got angry nor changed her mind—­a bad sign for Jimmy.  She put his hand away, saying, “You must forgive me the kiss.”

Jimmy jumped to his feet with another inarticulate sound, every whit as bad as an oath, and stood before her.

“Agatha Redmond, will you marry me?”

“No.”

Jim turned in his tracks and left the wood.

Two hours later, at supper, Jim was inquired for.

“Our last supper together, and Mr. Hambleton not here!” mourned Chamberlain.

Agatha felt guilty, but could scarcely confess it.  “You are all invited for next year, you know,” she said.

“And we’re all coming,” announced Melanie.  “But poor Mr. Hambleton will miss his supper tonight.”

The “poor Mr. Hambleton” struck Agatha.  “I think Mr. Hambleton is doing very well indeed.  I saw him start off for a walk this afternoon.”

“Jim’s a chump.  Give him a cold potato,” jeered Aleck.

But after supper was over, and the twilight deepened into darkness, Agatha sought Aleck where she could speak with him alone.

“I—­I think Mr. Hambleton was troubled when he left here this afternoon,” she said.  “Can you think where he would be likely to go?  He is not strong enough to bear much hard exercise yet.”

Aleck looked at her keenly.

“If he went anywhere, I think he’d go straight to the yacht.”

“I feel a little anxious, someway,” confessed Agatha.

Chamberlain’s voice broke in upon them.  “Anybody ready to take me down to the Sea Gull in the car?”

As Aleck started for the machine, the anxiety in Agatha’s face perceptibly lightened.  “And may I go with you?” she asked eagerly.

CHAPTER XXIV