ss
her ideas; so, though she adored Harry, she only said to her mother in
confidence, when in a serious mood, that he was all right; and when in a
more playful frame of mind to her girl-friends, that he was a little
_bit_ of all right.

"Alec," he said, making her sit down in the lowest chair (he could not
bear her towering over him), "isn't it a bore that I can't come on the
yacht?"

"Pretty useless," she answered.

He took her hand.

"You won't forget me while I'm away, will you, Alec?"

"What do _you_ think?" she answered in a trembling voice, and then gave
a loud laugh.

"I don't think--I don't know."

"Oh, shut up!"

"Will you be just as nice when I see you again?" continued Harry, in a
carefully-modulated voice.

"Why do you ask me all this rot?" she said, with another uneasy laugh.
"Of course I shall."

"Good."

Harry couldn't think of anything else to say. Then he remembered....

"When I join you again I'm going to bring you a ring. What's your
favourite stone?"

"Rubies and diamonds," she answered without a moment's hesitation. "I
say, how sporting of you! That'll be ripping!"

He tried to feel touched by her artless joy. He knew he was not an
ideally ardent suitor.

"Well, we'll have a good time later on, eh?" he said in her own tone.

"Don't be a silly ass!" replied the girl, her eyes full of tears and
tenderness, and her heart of the most sincere joy and affection.

Harry laughed.

"Tell me, Alec, is your mother a soothing companion? Is she a nice woman
to live with?"

"Oh! _she's_ all right. A bit off colour sometimes. At least--well, she
_is_ all right, if you understand--and yet she's _not_--if you know what
I mean."

"Ah! that is a dark saying. You are pleased to be
mysterious--sphinx-like."

"You _are_ a rotter, Harry!"

"How subtle you are, Alec. How elusive is the lightning-play of your
wit!"

"_How_ much?"

"The random poppy of paradox grows too often in the golden cornfield of
your conversation," Harry went on, taking her hand.

"Oh, rats!" exclaimed the artless girl. "Can't make out what you're
driving at half the time, when you go on like that. Don't believe you
know yourself."

"Don't I? Really now, you know, we're almost--well--privately engaged.
May I kiss you, Alec?"

She blushed crimson, turned her face away, and said, "Please yourself."

Unable to help laughing, he kissed the top of her head, told her to
write to him, and left the house, feeling like