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38 father, were engaged in the most serious conversation of their young lives.

"So," said she, "you could not content yourself at Harvard?"

"No. The restraint imposed by the set rules of college was slowly sapping up and killing my ambition. So I came here to realize my artistic dreams."

"Your leaving the university, Milton, has seriously displeased me."

"In what way, dearest Marie?"

"Don't attempt to mollify me by endearing terms. Now, you know that you had been selected on the boat crew, and the girls have whispered all around that you were afraid to stay."

"And does my little sweetheart," said he, with infinite patience, "believe that silly story?"

"Well," she confessed, "of course I don't exactly believe it, but the talk of the crowd hurts me. Then again, could you not study your art from a man?"

"Oh," said Milton, thinking to himself that if jealousy was at the bottom of his sweetheart's apparent anger, surely he could scent trouble ahead.

"Why don't you answer?" she said.

"I was thinking."

"You have no right to think. That isIwell, I am almost beginning to hate Ouida Angelo."

"Why, that is really absurd, little one."

"Milton, I hate all things that seem to lead you from me."

"Nothing, and no one, can do that," said Milton.

"You are with her hours and hours; I almost forget how you look, I see you so seldom these days," complained the girl.