very minute.'

"Now, wasn't that talk silly? De Vezin had brought me a two-centime
piece one day because I said I had never seen one, and I put a hole
in it and hung it to my chain. Fred to call that a _gage d'amour!_

"'Nonsense!' said I.

"'De Vezin thought the same when he saw it there. I took him for a
fool, but I see he was right.'

"'Well, now you will see you were both fools,' said I angrily, and I
twisted off the coin and threw it from the window.

"'Is only that preposterous notion in the way?' he asked, looking
happy again and taking a seat by me.

"I told you how I cried on first entering the cars, and now--would
you believe it?--I got terribly embarrassed. It seemed as if
everything I did or said made matters worse. I was scarcely able to
stammer, 'My aunt--'

"'I will speak to her. Let me put this on your finger until I can
replace it by another:' and he slipped off his seal and leaned
forward with an entreating look.

"I shook my head.

"'I won't ask you to promise anything: only wear it that I may not
be forgotten in Rome.'

"'No, no, I cannot!' I exclaimed, clasping my hands. I suppose the
action and tone were very exaggerated, for Mr. Kenderdine drew back,
saying, 'I shall not _force_ you to take it;' and then went to the
other window, took a newspaper out of his pocket and pretended to
read it, while I was angry and sorry and miserable, though why I
should feel so much like crying at what had only amused me the day
before I cannot understand. I suppose none of those wonderful ladies
would have acted so, would they?

"But you are tired long ago, and you can easily imagine what comes
after. See!" and she turned a ring on her finger until I could catch
the shimmer of its stone. "That is how it ended; and though I did
not accept it until the next spring in Rome, I shall always blame
that night for the whole affair. When I asked Fred why he took the
trouble to follow me after the double snubbing I had given him, he
said 'I was worth it.' But since we are engaged he teases me
shamefully--calls me doctor, hopes I intend to support him in
comfort and ease, and says that it always was his ambition to be the
husband of a strong-minded woman, and broadly hints about my
experience in traveling being so useful to him. And aunt? When I
first