n the
piazza; and it is just as true that Miss Nellie colored deeply, though
it may have been only the natural consequence of her surprise.

"I beg your pardon, Nellie; I did not mean to frighten you," replied
Donald.

"I don't suppose you did, Don John; but you startled me just as much as
though you had meant it," added she, with a pleasant smile, so forgiving
that the young man had no fear of the consequences. "How terribly hot it
is! I am almost melted."

"It is very warm," answered Donald, who, somehow or other, found it very
difficult to carry on a conversation with Nellie; and his eyes seemed to
him to be twice as serviceable as his tongue.

"It is dreadful warm."

And so they went on repeating the same thing over and over again, till
there was no other known form of expression for warm weather.

"How in the world did you get to the side of my chair without my hearing
you?" demanded Nellie, when it was evidently impossible to say anything
more about the heat.

"I came up the front steps, and was walking around on the piazza to your
father's library. I didn't see you till you spoke," replied Donald,
reminded by this explanation that he had come to Captain Patterdale's
house for a purpose. "Is Ned at home?"

"No; he has gone up to Searsport to stay over Sunday with uncle Henry."

"Has he? I'm sorry. Is your father at home?"

"He is in his library, and there is some one with him. Won't you sit
down, Don John?"

"Thank you," added Donald, seating himself in a rustic chair. "It is
very warm this afternoon."

Nellie actually laughed, for she was conscious of the difficulties of
the situation--more so than her visitor. But we must do our hero--for
such he is--the justice to say, that he did not refer to the exhausted
topic with the intention of confining the conversation to it, but to
introduce the business which had called him to the house.

"It is intensely hot, Don John," laughed Nellie.

"But I was going to ask you if you would not like to take a sail," said
Donald, with a blush. "With your father, I mean," added he, with a
deeper blush, as he realized that he had actually asked a girl to go
out in a boat with him.

"I should be delighted to go, but I can't. Mother won't let me go on the
water when the sun is out, it hurts my eyes so," answered Nellie; and
the young man was sure she was very sorry she could not go.

"Perhaps we can go after sunset, then," suggested Donald. "I am sorry
Ned is not