“I’m going to ask you something,” he said earnestly.

Mavis was filled with a great apprehension.

“If I weren’t a bad egg, and could offer you a home worthy of you, I wonder if you’d care to marry me?”

An exclamation of astonishment escaped her.

“I mean it,” he continued, “and why not?  You’re true-hearted and straight and wonderful to look at.  Little Mavis is a pearl above price, and she doesn’t know it.”

“Ssh! ssh!” she murmured.

“You’re a rare find,” he said, to add after a moment or two, “and I know what I’m talking about.”

She did not speak, but her bosom was violently disturbed, whilst a delicious feeling crept about her heart.  She repressed an inclination to shed tears.

“Now I s’pose your upset, eh?” he remarked.

“Why should I be?” she asked with flashing eyes.

It was now his turn to be surprised.  She went on: 

“It’s a thing any woman should be proud of, a man asking her to share her life with him.”

His lips parted, but he did not speak.

She drew herself up to her full, queenly height to say: 

“I am very proud.”

“Ah!  Then—­then—­”

His hands caught hers.

“Let me go,” she pleaded.

“But—­”

“I want to think.  Let me go:  let me go!”

His hands still held hers, but with an effort she freed herself, to run from him in the direction of her lodging.  She did not once look back, but hurried as if pursued by danger, safety from which lay in the companionship of her thoughts.

Arrived at Mrs Farthing’s, she made no pretence of sitting down to her waiting supper, but went straight upstairs to her room.  She felt that a crisis had arisen in her life.  To overcome it, it was necessary for her to decide whether or not she loved Charlie Perigal.  She passed the best part of a sleepless night endeavouring, without success, to solve the problem confronting her.  Jill, who always slept on Mavis’ bed, was alive to her mistress’ disquiet.  The morning sun was already high in the heavens when Jill crept sympathetically to the girl’s side.

Mavis clasped her friend in her arms to say: 

“Oh, Jill, Jill!  If you could only tell me if I truly loved him!”

Jill energetically licked Mavis’ cheek before nestling in her arms to sleep.

The early morning post brought a letter from Perigal to Mavis, which she opened with trembling hands and beating heart.  It ran:—­

“For your sake, not for mine, I’m off to Wales by the early morning train.  If you care for me ever so little (and I am proud to believe you do), in clearing out of your life, I am doing what I conceive to be the best thing possible for your future happiness.  If it gives you any pleasure to know it, I should like to tell you I love you.  My going away is some proof of this statement, C. P.

“P.S.—­I have written by the same post to Windebank to give him your address.”