"I have made a great mistake, for which I ask pardon;" and, after looking at her for a moment, in blank incertitude as to whether she could really be the same person whom he had come to seek in such happy confidence half an hour before, he raised his hat, his new light gray hat, and was gone.
Ruth watched him go, and when he had disappeared, she sat down again mechanically in the chair from which she had risen a few moments before, and pressed her hands tightly together.

She ought not to have allowed such a thing to happen, she said to herself.

Somehow it had never presented itself to her in its serious aspect before.

It is difficult to take a vain man seriously.

Poor Mr.Dare! She had not known he was capable of caring so much about anything.