gentle as she looks. Elizabeth seemed yielding, too. But in the end she showed her fortitude. If she had been weak, she would have stayed with Louis and tried to win him back. But her self-respect wouldn't let her do it. She couldn't sue for something which had once been given freely."
"I had thought," Crispin said, "of going to Round Hill and telling her father that I intend to marry her. What do you think?"
Aunt Olivia shook her head. "I wouldn't. He might make it harder for Hildegarde. He is a man of strong likes and dislikes. I remember Elizabeth told us of a man friend of Louis', named Winslow. Elizabeth had reasons to distrust him. More reason than she dared tell Louis. But she knew his influence was bad. He was comparatively poor then, but she heard afterward he had made a lot of money. And he used Carew to help him in his schemes. And when Elizabeth wouldn't help him, he worked against her. It was he who told her first about Corinne. Little things—planting suspicions. But she could never make Louis see that Winslow was a snake in the grass. They are still friends, I presume. Hildegarde has mentioned him in her letters."
"He's there all the time," Crispin told them. "Hildegarde hates him."
"If he finds it out, he'll hate her," Miss Olivia said.
"That's why I want to get her away from it all," Crispin asserted. "Oh, why should I let things drift when it means so much to me?"
He got up and walked around the room, talking to them. He seemed to the old aunts rather like a splen-
