"I know what I'm at. Lord bless you, I'm not going to lose my head
because I see a fine woman."

"Or your heart either?"

"Oh, heart! There's nothing of that kind of thing about me. I regard
a woman as a picture or a statue. I dare say I shall marry some day,
because men do; but I've no idea of losing myself about a woman."

"I'd lose myself ten times over for--"

"L. D.," said Cradell.

"That I would. And yet I know I shall never have her. I'm a jolly,
laughing sort of fellow; and yet, do you know, Caudle, when that girl
marries, it will be all up with me. It will, indeed."

"Do you mean that you'll cut your throat?"

"No; I shan't do that. I shan't do anything of that sort; and yet it
will be all up with me."

"You are going down there in October;--why don't you ask her to have
you?"

"With ninety pounds a year!" His grateful country had twice increased
his salary at the rate of five pounds each year. "With ninety pounds
a year, and twenty allowed me by my mother!"

"She could wait, I suppose. I should ask her, and no mistake. If one