talent. He accused her openly of having fallen in love with this fellow; she wasn't a girl to do anything as silly as that except under a hypnotic influence. People did fall in love at first sight. There were Romeo and Juliet; Shakespeare was a fairly wise guy--these letters every day--why, if she wrote to him, Horace, once a week he was lucky--but every day to this man. And jewels and money--no, not much!
Jealousy, which is popularly supposed to be an erratic and fantastic emotion, is often founded on the soundest intuition. Augusta found herself hampered in defending herself by a certain inner doubt; and her silence enabled Horace to work himself up to such a pitch that he issued an ultimatum--a dangerous thing to do. She would either marry him and go to Canada with him, or else everything was over between them.
It was a terrible situation for Augusta. On the one hand, her spoken word, given to a person whose good opinion she greatly desired, and on the other, her sincere love of Horace, increased by the decisive stand he was taking; for it is unfortunately true that if you do not hate a person for making a scene you love him more.
Perhaps Horace saw this. In any case, he would not retreat an inch.
This was the situation when the door of the library opened and in came Augusta's friend and classmate, Pearl Leavitt, with whom she had an engagement for luncheon--only in the general strain and excitement of the morning she had entirely forgotten the fact.
To be continued...
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