you're all
right!"

Gilbert returned to the room where Nevada waited.

"My old friend, Jack Peyton, and his sister were to have been here at
a quarter to twelve," he explained; "but Jack is so confoundedly slow.
I've just 'phoned them to hurry. They'll be here in a few minutes. I'm
the happiest man in the world, Nevada! What did you do with the letter
I sent you to-day?"

"I've got it cinched here," said Nevada, pulling it out from beneath
her opera-cloak.

Gilbert drew the letter from the envelope and looked it over carefully.
Then he looked at Nevada thoughtfully.

"Didn't you think it rather queer that I should ask you to come to my
studio at midnight?" he asked.

"Why, no," said Nevada, rounding her eyes. "Not if you needed me.
Out West, when a pal sends you a hurry call--ain't that what you say
here?--we get there first and talk about it after the row is over. And
it's usually snowing there, too, when things happen. So I didn't mind."

Gilbert rushed into another room, and came back burdened with overcoats
warranted to turn wind, rain, or snow.

"Put this raincoat on," he said, holding it for her. "We have a quarter
of a mile to go. Old Jack and his sister will be here in a few minutes."
He began to struggle into a heavy coat. "Oh, Nevada," he said, "just
look at the headlines on the front page of that evening paper on the
table, will you? It's about your section of the West, and I know it will
interest you."

He waited a full minute, pretending to find trouble in the getting on of
his overcoat, and then turned. Nevada had not moved. She was looking at
him with strange and pensive directness. Her cheeks had a flush on them
beyond the color that had been contributed by the wind and snow; but her
eyes were steady.

"I was going to tell you," she said, "anyhow, before you--before
we--before--well, before anything. Dad never gave me a day of schooling.
I never learned to read or write a darned word. Now if--"

Pounding their uncertain way up-stairs, the feet of Jack, the somnolent,
and Agnes, the grateful, were heard.

V

When Mr. and Mrs. Gilbert Warren were spinning softly homeward in a
closed carriage, after the ceremony, Gilbert said:

"Nevada, would you really like to know what I wrote you in the letter
that you received to-night?"

"Fire away!" said his bride.

"Word for word," said Gilbert, "it was this: 'My dear Miss Warren--You
were right about the flower. It was a hydrangea, and not