"Mabel," he cried, "you are sure? Then I will not let you go. Had you tied that 'granny' knot on the right foot, I—we—as an R.A.M.C. man, I——"
She clung to him sobbingly.
"Charles, oh Charles," she panted, "you have proved it to me. You love me! (Is my heart throbbing now?) You love me and it will break for joy!"
The phalanges and the metacarpal bones of her left hand clicked together as if in sympathy as she flung it to her side.
Again her cerebrum flashed its joyful message, so that she repeated, "My heart!"
At the word Charles, the R.A.M.C. man, rose from his patella and placed his hands firmly on his femur bones.
His whole bearing had changed.
"This," he said slowly and ringingly, "is the end. When I entered this room I loved you—I admit it. But—you have deceived me! Look at that hand! It is covering—what? The floating costae! Your heart is not where you would have me believe. It is fully three inches higher and more to the right. That is not a small matter, or one with which you should trifle as you do. But you have deceived me in a greater than that."
"Oh, what is it? What have I done?" sobbed Mabel hysterically.
"The greater matter," continued Charles in trumpet tones, "is that the heart is not the seat of the emotions at all. I can only conclude that your agitation was feigned. I wish you good-day, Madam."