Robin being out of the way, Carl took
every opportunity of denouncing him as a
libertine and ridiculing him as a simpleton
in Alice's presence, and as she never said a
word in his favour, Carl thought he was
progressing famously in his suit.

He got his father's permission to marry
her; old Ike thought if she had not a fortune
she would save one, seeing that she had no
hankering after women's finery, and was
content to sit reading and sewing, drawing
and singing, the year round. Carl redoubled
his assiduities, but whenever he had made up
his mind, and got ready a speech of proposal
to Alice, something in her manner indescribably
icy and repellant drove him back again
into himself. As far as selfish people ever do
love, Carl loved Alice, and her pertinacious
blindness to the fact half maddened him. He
could not stir her from her impassibility one
iota. Her eyes—ever pure, cool, and self-
possessed, would meet his calmly; her cheek
kept its uniform tint, her voice its even
unembarrassed flow, no matter what he looked,
spoke, or insinuated. Ike laughed at his son;
he said, Robin would have wooed, won and
married the girl, while Carl stood looking at
her like grapes hung too high for his reach.
Carl was mortified; he was afraid his father
spake truth, and that Robin was Alice's
favourite. So, in the end, he spoke to her.

It was one rich July evening when she was
sitting in the dismal parlour reading. Even
in there came a ray or two of dusty sunshine,
and when he approached her, Carl, for a
moment, fancied she blushed; but he was speedily
undeceived; it was only the red reflection
of a ray through the crimson window-curtain,
and her gown was blushing as much as she.
He asked what she was reading; and, without
looking up, she answered, "The May
Queen."

"Can you leave it a minute, and listen to
me?"

He spoke as if he were addressing her
about the household accounts, which it
was her province to keep. She read to the end of
the page, shut up the book and, looking him
straight in the face, said, "Well?" He
stamped impatiently, walked to and fro the
room, came back and stood before her: the
faintest suspicion of a smile lurked about
Alice's mouth, as she asked what disturbed
him?

"It is you—you, Alice! Do you know how
I have been worshipping you—adoring you—
for months?"

"I'm surprised at you, cousin Carl, I
thought you had more sense; I am not a
goddess," was the quiet reply. There was
no feeling in her face.

"How I have been loving you, Alice!"
And he brought down his heel with another
imperative stamp.

The girl's eyes went straight from his
countenance, gloomy, passionate, and eager,
to his impatient foot. "Carl," she said,
gravely, "it is the surest sign in the world
that I do not love you in return, because I
never found you out. I never should have
found it out if you had not told me.
Perhaps it is a mistake."

"A mistake! What on earth do you
mean?"

"What I say;—neither more nor less."

"I do love you, Alice; I would give my
life for you;" and Carl sank his voice to a
pleading tone.

"That is a mere phrase; besides, I know
you would not. I don't think you would give
a much smaller thing for me. There was a
man came yesterday about a little sum of
money that he owes to my uncle. I heard you
tell him that if the debt were not paid within
three days you should proceed against him;
he said, with tears in his eyes, that he had
not the means,—he pleaded his sickly wife
and his family of young children, and you
sent him away with your first answer. You
have plenty of money, Carl; if I made a
point of it, would you pay that man's debt?"

"Nonsense, Alice, you don't understand
business," was the half-peevish, half-confused
reply.

"Then I have made a poor use of my
opportunities, for I have heard of little else all
my life long; and I answer you, cousin Carl,
you do not understand love as I understand
it, and I have no love of my kind to give
you."

"You are thinking of Robin, that poor,
sackless fool! Why, Alice, he does not care
for you as I do; he is a wild, extravagant,
reckless scapegrace, who would make you
miserable."

"He is a better man than you, Carl. I
never shudder away from the grasp of his
hand—"

"You shudder from my touch!"

"Yes; I am always conscious of your
presence as I am conscious of thunder in the air
before the storm bursts; when I hear you
speak I think that is the tongue that would
lie away Robin's good name: when you give
me your hand in the morning I think how
many unfortunate creatures' dooms it will
sign before night, and how many it signed
yesterday. When you laugh, I say, to myself,
some poor soul is weeping, perhaps, for a hard
deed of yours—no, cousin Carl, I do not love
you; I never can love you."

"You give me my answer plainly."

"Yes. You said to me last night, 'Whatever
you are, be practical.' I am practical,
therefore. Now, may I go on with my
story?"

He made her no reply, and she took up
the book. Carl was standing with his back
to the window, looking down on her pure,
serene countenance. He liked her better
than ever. Her reproaches did not sting
him at all; they were weak and womanish,
but natural, from a heart like hers: he could
afford to smile at them.