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The butler stood in the doorway, with two letters on a salver. One he handed to Mary, the other to John, and walked away with a twinkle in his eye. However, even our butlers do not know everything that happens in our houses (to say nothing of our hearts), however much they may think they do.

John glanced at his letter, started violently and crushed it into his pocket. He glanced at Mary; her letter lay neglected on her lap. She was looking steadily out of the window.

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Well, that's settled," said John. -I think I'll have a cigar, dear.” "Yes, do, darling," said Mary, and John went out.

These second letters were unfortunately so long as to make it impossible to reproduce them. They were also very affecting. Dora's from its pathos, Charlie's from its passion. But the waves of emotion beat fruitlessly on the rock-built walls of conscience. At almost the same moment, Mary, brushing away a tear, and John, blowing his nose, sat down to write a brief, a final answer. We are to be married today fortnight," they said. They closed the envelopes without a moment's delay and went to drop their letters in the box. The butler was already waiting to go to the post with them and a second later the fateful documents were on their way to Cannes.

"Now," said John, with a ghastly smile, "we can have a glorious long day together!"

Mary was determined to leave herself no loophole.

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We must tell Aunt what-what we have decided upon this morning," she reminded him. "It means that the wedding must be very quiet."

Shall you?"

"I sha'n't mind that. "I shall like it of all things," she answered. "Come and find Aunt Sarah." Miss Bussey had always-or at least for a great many years back-maintained the general proposition that young people do not know their own minds. This morning's vows confirmed her opinion.

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Why the other day you both agreed that the middle of June would do perfectly. Now you want it all done in a scramble."

The pair stood before her, lookin very guilty.

"What is the meaning of this-thi [she very nearly said "indecent"] ex traordinary haste?"

Miss Bussey asked only one indul gence from her friends. Before she did a kind thing she liked to be allowed to say one or two sharp ones. Her niece was aware of this fancy of hers and took refuge in silence. John, less experienced in his hostess's ways, launched into the protests appropriate to an impatient lover.

"Well," said Miss Bussey, "I must say you look properly ashamed of yourself [John certainly did], so Ill see what can be done. What a fluster we shall live in! Upon my word you might as well have made it to-morrow. The fuss would have been no worse and a good deal shorter."

The next few days passed, as Miss Bussey had predicted, in a fluster. Mary was running after dress-makers, John after licenses, Cook's tickets, a best man, and all the impedimenta of a marriage. The intercourse of the lovers was much interrupted, and to this Miss Bussey attributed the low spirits that Mary sometimes displayed.

"There, there, my dear," she would say impatiently-for the cheerful old lady hated long faces, "you'll have enough of him and to spare by and by."

Curiously this point of view did not exhilarate Mary. She liked John very much; she esteemed him even more than she liked him, he would, she thought, have made an ideal brother. Ah, why had she not made a brother of him while there was time? Then she would have enjoyed his constant friendship all her life; for it was not with him as with that foolish boy, Charlie, all or nothing. John was reasonable ; he would not have threatened-well, reading his letter one way, Charlie almost seemed to be tampering with propriety. John would never have done that. And these reflections, all of which should have pleaded for John, ended in weeping over the lost charms of Charlie.

One evening, just a week before the wedding, she roused herself from some

such sad meditations, and, duty-driven, sought John in the smoking - room. The door was half open and she entered noiselessly. John was sitting at the table; his arms were outspread on it, and his face buried in his hands. Thinking he was asleep she approached on tiptoe and leant over his shoulder. As she did so her eyes fell on a sheet of note-paper; it was clutched in John's right hand, and the encircling grasp covered it, save at the top. The top was visible, and Mary, before she knew what she was doing, had read the embossed heading-nothing else, just the embossed heading-Hotel de Luxe, Cannes, Alpes Maritimes.

The drama teaches us how often a guilty mind rushes, on some trifling cause, to self-revelation. Like a flash came the conviction that Charlie had written to John, that her secret was known, and John's heart broken. In a moment she fell on her knees crying,

"Oh, how wicked I've been. Forgive me, do forgive me! Oh, John, can you forgive me?"

John was not asleep-he also was merely meditating; but, if he had been a very Rip Van Winkle this cry of agony would have roused him. He started violently--as well he might from his seat, looked at Mary, and crumpled the letter into a shapeless ball.

"You didn't see?" he asked, hoarsely. "No, but I know. I mean I saw the heading, and knew it must be from him. Oh, John!"

"From him!" "Yes. He's-he's staying there. Oh, John! really I'll never see or speak to him again. Really I won't. Oh, you can trust me, John. See! I'll hide nothing. Here's his letter! You see I've sent him away?"

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Why don't you show me his letter? I don't know what he's said about me.' "What could he say about you?" "Well he he might say that-that I cared for him, John."

"And do you?" demanded John, and his voice was anxious.

Duty demanded a falsehood; Mary did her very best to satisfy its imperious commands. It was no use. “Oh, John,” she murmured; and then began to cry.

For a moment wounded pride struggled with John's relief; but then a glorious vision of what this admission of Mary's might mean to him swept away his pique.

"Read this," he said, giving her Dora Bellairs's letter, "and then we'll have an explanation."

Half an hour later Miss Bussey was roused from a pleasant snooze. John and Mary stood beside her, hand in hand. They were brother and sister now-that was an integral part of the arrangement-and so they stood hand in hand. Their faces were radiant.

"We came to tell you, Auntie dear, that we have decided that we're not suited to one another," began Mary. Not at all," said John, decisively. Miss Bussey stared helplessly from one to the other.

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Auntie, I want to go with him to Cannes."

This last suggestion, which naturally did not appear to any well-regulated mind to harmonize with what had gone before, restored voice to Miss Bussey.

"What's the matter with you? Are you mad?" she demanded.

John sat down beside her. His friends anticipated a distinguished Parliamentary career for John; he could make anything sound reasonable. Miss Bussey was fascinated by his suave and fluent narrative of what had befallen Mary and himself; she could not but admire his just remarks on the providential disclosure of the true state of the case before it was too late, and sympathized with the picture of suffering nobly suppressed which grew under his skilful hand; she was inflamed when he ardently declared his purpose of seeking out Dora; she was touched when he kissed Mary's hand and declared that the world had no nobler woman. Before John's eloquence even the stern facts of a public engagement, of invited guests, of dresses ordered and presents received, lost their force, and the romantic spirit, rekindled, held undivided sway in Miss Bussey's heart. "But," she said, "why does Mary talk of going to Cannes with you?" "Mr. Allerton is at Cannes, Aunt," murmured Mary, shyly.

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But you can't travel with John.” Oh, but you must come too." "It looks as if you were running after him."

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they went off in a torrent of mutual laudation.

Miss Bussey shook her head.

"If they think all that of one another why don't they marry," she said.

CHAPTER IV

THE TALE OF A POSTMARK

"YES," said Lady Deane, "we leave to-day week: Roger has to be back the first week in May, and I want to stop at one or two places en route.”

"Let's see. To-day's the 19th, no, the 20th; there's nothing to remind one of time here. That'll be the 27th. That's about my date; we might go together if you and Deane have no objection."

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“Oh, I should be delighted, General; and shall you stay at all in Paris? "A few days-just to show Dolly the sights."

"How charming! And you and I must have some expeditions together. Roger is so odd about not liking to take me.'

"We'll do the whole thing, Lady Deane," answered General Bellairs, heartily. "Notre Dame, the Versailles, the Invalides, Eiffel Tower."

Lady Deane's broad, white brow showed a little pucker.

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"That wasn't quite what I meant," said she. "Oh, but Roger could take Dora to those, couldn't he, while you and I made a point of seeing some of the real life of the people?-of studying them in their ordinary resorts, their places of recreation and amusement."

"Oh, the Français, and the opera, and so on, of course."

"No, no, no," exclaimed Lady Deane, tapping her foot impatiently and fixing her gray eyes on the General's now puzzled face. "Not the same old treadmill in Paris as in London! Not that, General!" What then, my dear lady?" asked he. "Your wish is law to me," and it was true that he had become very fond of his earnest young friend. What do you want to see, the Chamber of Deputies?"

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Sir Roger's voice struck in.

"I'm not a puritanical husband, Bel

lairs, but I must make a stand somewhere. Not the Chamber of Deputies."

"Don't be silly, Roger dear," said Lady Deane, in her usual tone of dispassionate reproof.

"I can't find out where she does want to go to," remarked the General.

"I can tell you," said Sir Roger, and he leant down and whispered a name in the General's ear. The General jumped.

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"Good heavens!" he exclaimed. haven't been there since the fifties. it still like what it used to be?" "How should I know?" inquired Sir Roger. "I'm not a student of social phenomena. Maud is, so she wants to go."

Lady Deane was looking on with a quiet smile.

She never mentioned it," protested the General.

"Oh, of course if there's a worse place now!" conceded Sir Roger.

"I'll make up my mind when we arrive," observed Lady Deane. "Anyhow I shall rely on you, General."

The General looked a little uncomfortable.

"If Deane doesn't object

"I shouldn't think of taking my wife to such places."

Suddenly Dora Bellairs rushed up to them.

"Have you seen Mr. Ellerton?" she cried. "Where is he?"

"In the salon," answered Sir Roger. "Do you want him?"

"Would you mind. I can't go in there it's full of men."

"After all we must be somewhere," pleaded Sir Roger as he went on his errand.

"Dolly," said the General, "I've just made a charming arrangement. Lady Deane and Sir Roger start for Paris to-day week, and we're going with them. You said you'd like another week here." "It's charming our being able to go together, isn't it?" said Lady Deane. Dora's face did not express rapture, yet she liked the Deanes very much.

"Oh, but" she began. "Well?" asked her father.

"I rather want to go a little sooner." "I'm afraid," said Lady Deane, "we

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"Yes."

"Thank you again."

She gave him her hand, which he pressed gently.

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Hullo!" said he.

"We seem to

have got up by the church somewhere. Where were we going to?"

"Why, to Rumpelmayer's."

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'Oh, ah! Well, let's go back to the hotel."

Wonderings on the extraordinary coincidence, with an occasional reference to the tender tie of a common sorrow which bound them together, beguiled the journey back, and when they reached the hotel Dora was quite calm. Charlie seemed distinctly cheerful, and when his companion left him he sat down by Deane and remarked, in a careless way, just as if he neither knew nor cared what the rest of them were going to do,

"Well, I shall light out of here in a few days. I suppose you're staying some time longer?

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"Off in a week," said Sir Roger. "Oh, by Jove, that's about my mark. Going back to England?"

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Yes, I suppose so ultimately. We shall stay a few days in Paris en route. The Bellairs go with us." "Oh, do they?"

Sir Roger smiled gently "Surprised?" he asked. Charlie ignored the question. "And you aren't going to hurry?" he inquired.

"Why should we?"

Charlie sat silent. It was tolerably plain that, unless the few days en route were very few indeed, John Ashforth and Mary Travers were in a fair way to be prosperously and peacefully married before Dora Bellairs set foot in England. And if he stayed with the Bellairs, before he did, either! Charlie lit a cigarette and sat puffing and thinking

"Dashed nice girl, Dora Bellairs," observed Sir Roger.

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Think so?

"I do. She's the only girl I ever saw that Laing was smitten with." "Laing!" said Charlie.

"Well, what's the matter? He's an

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