you have been sufficiently punished." She looked for a moment at the woe-begone face of the culprit, and then she said, consolingly: "Hattie, I don't believe he was as serious as he thought for, if that's any comfort to you. He has probably tried to make himself think he is in love with you, just to spare your feelings. Any gentleman would feel bound to do what he could in such a situation,—and Mr. Swain is a gentleman, if he is a little stiff in his manners."
"I think, Mother," Hattie replied, with conscious dignity, "that if you had heard him talk, you would not have any doubt about his being in earnest."
Nor did Hattie ever admit any question on that point. Emerson Swain's words, and still more his manner, had been too convincing. She could not mistake the accent of sincerity with which he had said: "I love you." Gradually the first horror with which those words had filled her wore away, and she began to think of them with something very like toleration. It was asthough they were repeated over and over every day, so haunting was the tone of voice in which they had been spoken. After all, he was a man, this grave, self-contained schoolmaster. It was a man's love that had been offered her, and not a boyish fancy. There was something wonderfully stirring in his honest passion, which had asserted itself'so stoutly, in spite of his self-distrust and genuine humble-mindedness. She could not forget his words—she
