"I'll tell you a secret, Miriam."
Miriam smiled.
"We seem to be full of secrets to-day."
"Yes," returned Shirley, "only yours is a respectable married woman's
secret; mine mustn't be told ... Well," she confessed at last, "I've
seen Thorne since I came back, and----"
"No!" Miriam ejaculated.
"Yes! He proposed to me once more, and----"
Miriam leaned forward eagerly.
"You accepted him?"
Shirley frowned.
"No--if I had accepted him, it wouldn't be a secret."
Miriam looked at her blankly.
"Why did you refuse him?"
Shirley seemed puzzled.
"That's just what I want to know myself. I don't know why.... Somehow, I
couldn't marry Thorne."
"Well, for some unexplainable reason, I'm glad of that," assented
Miriam.
"Tell me about Murgatroyd," said Shirley suddenly, reseating herself. "I
haven't seen him----"
"There isn't much to tell," answered Miriam. "As a reformer, he's been a
success. He's serving his second term as prosecutor, you know. It seems
he wanted to finish his work there."
Shirley tossed her head.
"Who couldn't, with all that money!"
"He and Thorne," went on Miriam, "are rivals for the United States
Senatorship. Things are growing warm, too, I hear; but it's only a
question of a day or two now...."