o loved each other."

Miss Trotter for the first time felt embarrassed, and this made her a
little angry. "I don't think I gave your brother any right to speak
for me or of me in this matter," she said icily; "and if you are quite
satisfied, as you say you are, of your own affection and Frida's, I do
not see why you should care for anybody'sinterference."

"Now you are angry with me," he said in a doleful voice which at any
other time would have excited her mirth; "and I've just done it. Oh,
Miss Trotter, don't! Please forgive me! I didn't mean to say your talk
was no good. I didn't mean to say you couldn't help us. Please don't be
mad at me!"

He reached out his hand, grasped her slim fingers in his own, and
pressed them, holding them and even arresting her passage. The act was
without familiarity or boldness, and she felt that to snatch her hand
away would be an imputation of that meaning, instead of the boyish
impulse that prompted it. She gently withdrew her hand as if to continue
her walk, and said, with a smile:--

"Then you confess you need help--in what way?"

"With her!"

Miss Trotter stared. "With HER!" she repeated. This was a new idea. Was
it possible that this common, ignorant girl was playing and trifling
with her golden opportunity? "Then you are not quite sure of her?" she
said a little coldly.

"She's so high spirited, you know," he said humbly, "and so attractive,
and if she thought my friends objected and were saying unkind things
of her,--well!"--he threw out his hands with a suggestion of hopeless
despair--"there's no knowing what she might do."

Miss Trotter's obvious thought was that Frida knew on which side her
bread was buttered; but remembering that the proprietor was a widower,
it occurred to her that the young woman might also have it buttered on
both sides. Her momentary fancy of uniting two lovers somehow weakened
at this suggestion, and there was a hardening of her face as she said,
"Well, if YOU can't trust her, perhaps your brother may be right."

"I don't say that, Miss Trotter," said Chris pleadingly, yet with a
slight wincing at her words; "YOU could convince her, if you would only
try. Only let her see that she has some other friends beside myself.
Look! Miss Trotter, I'll leave it all to you--there! If you will only
help me, I will promise not to see her--not to go near her again--until
you have talked with her. There! Even my brother would not object
to that. And if he h