The Argosy — page 382: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

Prudence Hart. 361 with all my heart, and if you can only like me enough to wait for me till I have got ahome to offer you, I—I think I shall be the happiest fellow living,” said the poor boy, with rather a break in his voice at the last words. It was an honest declaration, and no’ woman need have been ashamed to be touched by it; but Miss Prudence Hart had proved her right to the name she bore on a good many occasions already in her life, and though Keith was trembling as he finished speaking, the healthy colour in her cheeks hardly either deepened or declined, and she paced on steadily for a dozen steps or more after he had ended his speech, thoughtfully, to all appearance, revolving the proposal he had made. She was as cool as a melon, too, when, after that pause, she opened her lips. ‘ And what would all your people say to you, do you think, sup- posing I agreed to this arrangement ?” she composedly asked, and she turned to him and looked him straight in the face. ‘‘ As things stand at this moment, they are ‘atssexadls prepared to hear of it, perhaps P” The poor young man was gifted with only so small and ordinary an amount of self-control that, at this inquiry, he coloured to the roots of his hair. “They may not be prepared for it, but—but I should tell them at once, of course,” he said. e And they would no doubt be highly gratified by the intelligence ? ” replied Miss Hart suavely. And then she looked at him again as she might have looked at a beetle through which she had just stuck a pin, and the next moment gave a curious and, perhaps, not a very pleasant laugh. He was trying to find some answer to make to her sarcasm, and had uttered two or three words, when she interrupted him, not without a good deal of dignity: she was so entirely mistress of herself that it was quite easy for her to be dignified, whereas even self-possession for him was clearly, for the moment, a thing not to be attained. “Mr. Keith, I am not quite so simple as not to know how the matter stands,” she said. ‘‘ Before you compromise yourself any further, take back your proposal. You have meant it kindly, per- haps, but you have forgotten, I think, to take into account that IJ am likely to be a little too proud to accept it. If you want me to thank you, I thank you, and—decline your offer. And now,” she said composedly, ‘‘ let us never speak about this again.” But, of course, he began to speak about it again instantly: he might have hesitated before he opened his lips at all, knowing how much reason there was for hesitation; but, after he had once parted from his discretion, it was not likely that an admonition from her would keep him silent. So he pleaded his cause with all the ardour and the earnestness he could call to his aid, and she walked placidly COMMICOOOKS.c©