You are not seeking to marry me on account of my rank ?" The shot almost knocked him through the wall, he was so little prepared for it.

There was something so finely grotesque about the question and its parent suspicion, that he stopped to wonder and admire, and thus was he saved from laughing.

Then, without wasting precious time, he set about the task of convincing her that he had been lured by herself alone, and had fallen in love with her only, not her title and position; that he loved her with all his heart, and could not love her more if she were a duchess, or less if she were without home, name or family.

She watched his face wistfully, eagerly, hopefully, translating his words by its expression; and when he had finished there was gladness in her heart-- a tumultuous gladness, indeed, though outwardly she was calm, tranquil, even judicially austere.

She prepared a surprise for him, now, calculated to put a heavy strain upon those disinterested protestations of his; and thus she delivered it, burning it away word by word as the fuse burns down to a bombshell, and watching to see how far the explosion would lift him: "Listen--and do not doubt me, for I shall speak the exact truth.