ut of course you can do
nothing. I see that."

"No, we can do nothing. We have tried everything. I used to think it was
because she was so dull there at Yonkers with her family, and brooded
upon the one idea all the time, that she could not get over it; and at
first it did seem when she came to me that she would get over it. She
is very fond of gaiety--of young men's society, and she's had plenty
of little flirtations that didn't mean anything, and never amounted to
anything. Every now and then a letter would come from the wilds where he
was stationed, and spoil it all. She seemed to feel a sort of chivalrous
obligation because he was so far off and helpless and lonely."

"Yes, I understand," said Mrs. Brinkley. "What a pity she couldn't be
made to feel that that didn't deepen the obligation at all."

"I've tried to make her," said Miss Van Hook, "and I've been everywhere
with her. One winter we were up the Nile, and another in Nice, and last
winter we were in Rome. She met young men everywhere, and had offers
upon offers; but it was of no use. She remained just the same, and till
she met Mr. Mavering in Washington I don't believe--"

Miss Van Hook stopped, and Mrs. Brinkley said, "And yet she always
seemed to me particularly practical and level-headed--as the men say."

"So she is. But she is really very romantic about some things; and when
it comes to a matter of that kind, girls are about all alike, don't you
think?"

"Oh yes," said Mrs. Brinkley hopelessly, and both ladies looked out over
the water, where the waves came rolling in one after another to waste
themselves on the shore as futilely as if they had been lives.

In the evening Miss Anderson got two letters from the clerk, at the hour
when the ladies all flocked to his desk with the eagerness for letters
which is so engaging in them. One she pulled open and glanced at with
a sort of impassioned indifference; the other she read in one intense
moment, and then ran it into her pocket, and with her hand still on it
hurried vividly flushing to her room, and read and read it again with
constantly mounting emotion.

"WORMLEY's HOTEL, Washington, April 7, 188-.

"DEAR MISS ANDERSON,--I have been acting on your parting advice to look
out for that Mr. Lafflin of mine, and I have discovered that he is an
unmitigated scamp. Consequently there is nothing more to keep me in
Washington, and I should now like your advice about coming to Fortress
Monroe. Do you find