in an
Indian army post, who, whenever she appeared, caused the horizon to
become black with majors. Her head and heart remained true to the
absent Marmaduke--I am not so sure about her dancing feet!

Now that that experience is over, with the many others, we are at sea
and quiet again, with one tranquil day just like the other.

"What a honeymoon journey it would make, Charlotte!" said Dolly one
moonlight evening on deck. "It is so difficult to grow in knowledge of
people in New York or Washington. One doesn't even know one's self."

"All journeys must be good for honeymooners, don't you think?"

"Yes, in a way; but some places are created for lovers and newlyweds,
who are, after all, only explorers, Charlotte, forever discovering new
lands and annexing new territories."

"Yes; and sometimes falling into the hands of savages and cannibals, I
suppose."

"Yes; that must be terrible--the awakening to find that one has been
mistaken in a man!" sighed Dolly.

"I dare say we ought to worry lest men be mistaken in us; it might
happen, you know."

"Your mind is so logical, Charlotte! However, this voyage wouldn't
have to be idealized to meet the needs of honeymooners. In a Vermont
village where I sometimes stay I remember a girl who had to be married
on Sunday because she could not give up her position as
telegraph-operator till Saturday night. That was dull enough in all
conscience, but she was married in her high-school graduating dress,
and went to her grandmother's house, ten miles away, for her
wedding-journey. I think it required considerable inward felicity to
exalt that situation!"

I sat upright in my steamer chair. "Dorothea," I said sharply, "you
have been manufacturing conversation for the last five minutes--just
killing time for fear that I should ask you questions. Is there
anything on your mind? You have been absentminded and nervous for
days."

"Your imagination is working overtime, Charlotte," she answered. "We
are nearing home, that is all; and life presses closer."

I could not gainsay her, for every mile of ocean crossed makes my
heart beat faster. I seem to be living just now in a sort of pause
between my different lives. There is the heaven of my childhood in the
vague background; then the building of my "career," if so modest a
thing can be called by so shining a name; then the steady,
half-conscious growth of a love that illumines my labors, yet makes
them difficult and perplexing; and no