seem to matter now. Romeo and Juliet wouldn't have paid any attention
to the little family disagreement if they had lived to-day."

"In the case of Romeo and Juliet, if I remember correctly," said Ben,
"it was not exactly a question of friendship."

She colored deeply, but he refused to modify his statement, for, after
all, it was correct. "But difference of opinion _is_ an obstacle,"
he went on. "I have seen husbands and wives parted by differences of
opinion in the late war. And as far as I'm concerned there's a war
on now--a different war, and I came here to try to prevent my brother
marrying into an enemy influence--"

"Good Heavens!" cried Crystal. "You are Ben Moreton! Why didn't I see
it sooner? I'm Crystal Cord," and, lifting up her chin, she laughed.

That she could laugh as the gulf opened between them seemed to him
terrible. He turned his head away.

She stopped laughing. "You don't think it's amusing?" (He shook his
head.) "That we're relations-in-law, when we thought it was all so
unknown and romantic? No wonder I felt at home with you, when I've
read so many of your letters to David--such nice letters, too--and I
subscribe to your paper, and read every word of the editorials. And
to think that you would not lunch with me to-day, when my father asked
you."

"To think that it was you I was being asked to lunch with, and didn't
know it!"

"Well, you dine with us to-morrow," she answered, stating a simple
fact.

"Crystal," he said, and put his hand on hers as if this would help him
through his long explanation; but the continuity of his thought was
destroyed and his spirit wounded by her immediately withdrawing it;
and then--so exactly does the spring of love resemble the uncertain
glory of an April day--he was rendered perfectly happy again by
perceiving that her action was due to the publicity of their position
and not to repugnance to the caress.

Fortunately he was a man not without invention, and so when a few
minutes later she suggested opening the tea basket, he insisted on
moving to a more retired spot on the plea that the teakettle would
burn better out of the wind; and Crystal, who must have known that
Tomes never gave her a teakettle, but made the tea at home and put it
in a thermos bottle, at once agreed to the suggestion.

They moved back across the road, where irregular rocks sheltered small
plots of grass and wild flowers, and here, instead of an Arcadian
duet, they had, most unsu