“We don’t send playthings,” cried Catherine, her pride overcoming her shame.

“Nor anything at all, then, my lady?” I said. “Unless you will, here I go.”

“I promise, Ellen!” she cried, catching my dress. “Oh, put them in the fire, do, do!”

But when I proceeded to open a place with the poker the sacrifice was too painful to be borne. She earnestly supplicated that I would spare her one or two.

“One or two, Ellen, to keep for Linton’s sake!”

I unknotted the handkerchief, and commenced dropping them in from an angle, and the flame curled up the chimney.

“I will have one, you cruel wretch!” she screamed, darting her hand into the fire, and drawing forth some half-consumed fragments, at the expense of her fingers.