As Braden started to rise, she raised her eye-lids, and in her lovely eyes he saw horror, dread, appeal, all in one.

"I'm sorry," he murmured, in distress "I should have been more--" "It's all right," she said, recovering herself with an effort.

"I thought I had prepared myself for the question you were so sure to ask.

I have been through hell in the past two weeks, Braden.

I have had to listen to the most infamous proposals--but perhaps it would be better for me to repeat them to you just as they were made to me, and let you judge for yourself." She leaned back in the chair, as if suddenly tired.