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arms about the faintly visible girl, and all at once fling his hopes into the balance. He would ask her to marry him; if she loved him she would yield, if she did not . . . he would know. His heart began beating at his bold plan. He stepped forward, reached out arms that tingled to go about the girl, when there came the scratch and flare of a match. When Nessie saw the jeweller so near her she drew a little intake of breath and stepped quickly around to the opposite side of the table before she took off the chimney and lighted the lamp.

The jeweller watched the operation in silence. He was filled with a quivering sensation at what he had come so narrowly doing. But with the lamp lighted any such proposal became impossible.

Nessie stayed by the queer old china-bowled lamp until the jeweller was seated, and then chose another of the stiff green-plush chairs spaced along the wall at some distance from her caller. Belshue regretted his premature choice of seats. He felt instinctively that while a mature woman may be courted by words alone, a young girl, like other young animals, must be wooed by a series of slight physical contacts. The milliner's assistant seemed inviting. Even in the hot parlour she contrived to look cool. He could see her arms through her sheer blue sleeves, and her hands which lay demurely in her lap vaguely discovered the contour of her rounded thighs. Again he mentioned the heat in the parlour, implying the swing.

"It's been a hot day," she answered impersonally. "They're goin' to have a hot spell for their revival."

There was nothing for it except to make conversation about the dullnesses of village life with this girl sitting three chairs remote from him. He asked who would hold the meeting.

"Brother Blackman. They say he's a wonderful preacher."

Nessie would have liked to talk about the meeting and thus lead to the topic of Belshue's soul, which she once had a romantic notion of saving, but the jeweller let the opening