do you think I interest her? That's more to the point."
"I think you do. But Leila's coy, and if you're going in to win, you ought to make a braver attack. Now, I chance to know she's at this moment on that little south balcony, and if you go right straight there, you will have an excellent opportunity to discuss the weather with her."
"And you?"
"I see Mr. Chapin approaching in the dim distance. Oh, I wouldn't dismiss you until I had a perfectly good substitute! Hoo-hoo! Mr. Chapin! Don't you want to take me to see the ducks?"
Ernest Chapin came forward eagerly. He said little, but his eyes shone and his face glowed as he led Dorothy toward the duck pond, while Gale went on his quest of Leila.
"Why don't you talk?" said Dorothy, a little frightened at the tense silence.
Chapin stood still, turned her around, and looked deep in her eyes. "Because I'm too happy. I've heard of a happiness too deep for words, and now I know what it means."
"Don't," said Dorothy, weakly; "don't! I can't bear it! You promised you wouldn't!"
"Oh, no, I didn't But if I did,—if I promised it a hundred times,—I never could keep such a promise! To be with you,—alone with you! Oh, Dorothy!"
"Hush, there's Miss Abby!" and the two composed themselves just in time to smile at their hostess, who was sitting on a garden bench.
"Just the one I wanted to see!" called out Dorothy, gaily; "now you go away, Mr. Chapin, this is going to be a meeting of the Woman's Club." Chapin bowed and went on, and Dorothy sat down beside Miss Wadsworth and patted her hand.
Now Miss Abby was far from dull, and she scented trouble in the girl's manner. "Well," she said, drily, "have you quarrelled with Justin?"
"Aren't you the mind-reader!" and Dorothy looked honestly surprised. "No, we haven't exactly quarrelled, but, oh, well, Miss Abby, we're awfully different."
"Yes, you are, Dorothy, but I'm hoping your two natures will react on each other to the benefit of both."
Dorothy looked relieved. "Oh, do you think so? I'm so glad, for I've been wondering if I ought to marry him, when I'm so far from his ideal of all a woman should be."
"I wondered too, at first, but I've concluded that Justin loves you, as he never could love his 'ideal' if he had her."
"I know he loves me, but sometimes I feel so unworthy of his love. And, Miss Abby, I don't mean that I feel myself unworthy, but I'm so afraid he'll think I am."
The older woman smiled at this naive confession, but she said, "I understand, dear. But I think you ought to try a little harder to do and be as Justin wants you to. You love him, don't you?"
"I—I think so," faltered Dorothy, "but when he is so stern,—it makes me hate him!"
"That's a good sign," and Miss Abby smiled. "Better hate him than be indifferent. And I really think, my dear, that your love will grow steadily and surely, the longer you live with him, and learn what a really fine, true nature he has."
So Dorothy smoothed out her temper and patted her little soul on the back, and resolved to be awfully good to old Justin and not to flirt with other men to tease him, and especially never, never to let herself be left alone with Ernest Chapin for one single little minute.
And all the rest of the day, she devoted herself to Arnold, and was so sweet and docile and altogether angelic, that her lover concluded he had at last learned the way to manage her!
Though the house-party had been asked only for the week-end, most of the guests were easily persuaded to stay a few days longer.
Emory Gale and Campbell Crosby were the only ones who were unable to accept their host's invitation to remain longer at White Birches. Business called them, they declared, and they were obliged to leave at noon on Monday for Philadelphia.
Dorothy and Leila gave way to protestations of great grief at parting with them, and though the protestations were mere fooling, yet Crosby looked longingly into Dorothy's eyes, while, unconscious of this, Gale was pouring out his whole soul in a glance for Leila's benefit.
The girls had accompanied the departing guests in one of Justin's big motor-cars as far as the Fordham Heights Station. From here the men went to New York and later took the train for Philadelphia.
Though usually inclined to light and desultory chatter, Gale and Crosby said little to each other during the first miles of their train ride. But after they had smoked for awhile in silence, they grew a little less taciturn and a little more inclined to be sociable.
"Hang it all!" said Gale, at last, "if I had time and opportunity, I believe I could induce that sweet young thing to be all my very own!"
"What's the matter with you?" growled Crosby. "She's going to marry Justin, and you'd better keep off!"
"Great snakes, man! I don't mean Dorothy! I mean the pretty one, the lovely Leila."
"Oh, Miss Duane. Yes, she's pretty enough in her way, but she can't hold a candle to that rosy little peach of a Dorothy."
"Dorothy is a beauty, all right, but she's too indiscriminating in her favors. She'd flirt with anybody, whether she's engaged to him or not."
"I wish she'd flirt with me," said Crosby gloomily. "But never mind me. Are you really hit by the Duane girl? She's a thoroughbred, I admit, and I wish you luck, old man."
"But I never get a chance to see her. She lives 'way off in Ohio, or somewhere, and she's just here for the wedding festivities."
"Well, be expeditious. We'll go to White Birches again before the wedding, and she'll probably be there. I'll ask Cousin Abby to ask her, if you like. And then at the time of the wedding we'll all be at the Duncan house, I suppose, for a day or two, at least. I'm to be old Justin's best man. I told him I didn't want to, but I suppose I will. Oh, pshaw, man, if you've got any enterprise at all, you can find some way to woo and win a fair lady, without having her thrown at your head. I think she's ready to meet you half-way, anyhow."
Gale brightened up at this; but Crosby became more gloomy as he realized that Gale had a fair fighting chance, while he had none.
It was about five o'clock when they reached the station in Philadelphia.
"What are you doing to-night?" asked Gale, as they parted.
"Dunno. Depends mostly on what letters and stuff I find waiting for me. We ought to get together and talk over that Herrmann case."
"Yes; where's that data I gave you to look over?"
"It's in my duffle, somewhere. I'll hunt it out when I get to the hotel."
"All right; and you'd better drop in at the club to-night. I'm going to dine there, and then I'll tell you if I've had any word from Herrmann. There's lots of detail to be attended to in that case."
"I'll call you up and let you know what I can do, later. S'long, old man."
They parted, and Crosby went directly to the hotel where he made his home. Gale had rooms in a bachelor apartment-house, but Crosby declared that
