Promise me, Ned Winston, that you will return to Denver." She tantalized, tempted him even while she thus openly renounced.

He struggled madly with an almost overmastering desire to burst forth in strenuous denial, to lay his whole life unreservedly at her feet.

Yet something within the girl's resolute face steadied him, made him feel her decision as unchangeable.
"Beth--you--you will not listen ?" "No--not to another word." "You do not believe me ?" He marked the quick restraining pressure of her lips, the tumultuous rise and fall of her breast.
"Yes, I believe you," she admitted, almost wearily.

"You mean it--now; but--but it is impossible.

I wish you to go." An instant Winston stood looking straight into those dark, glowing eyes, and all his inherited strength of manhood came trooping back to aid him.