n Cleric was offered an instructorship at
Harvard College, and accepted it. He suggested that I should follow him
in the fall, and complete my course at Harvard. He had found out about
Lena--not from me--and he talked to me seriously.

'You won't do anything here now. You should either quit school and go
to work, or change your college and begin again in earnest. You
won't recover yourself while you are playing about with this handsome
Norwegian. Yes, I've seen her with you at the theatre. She's very
pretty, and perfectly irresponsible, I should judge.'

Cleric wrote my grandfather that he would like to take me East with him.
To my astonishment, grandfather replied that I might go if I wished. I
was both glad and sorry on the day when the letter came. I stayed in
my room all evening and thought things over. I even tried to persuade
myself that I was standing in Lena's way--it is so necessary to be
a little noble!--and that if she had not me to play with, she would
probably marry and secure her future.

The next evening I went to call on Lena. I found her propped up on the
couch in her bay-window, with her foot in a big slipper. An awkward
little Russian girl whom she had taken into her work-room had dropped a
flat-iron on Lena's toe. On the table beside her there was a basket
of early summer flowers which the Pole had left after he heard of the
accident. He always managed to know what went on in Lena's apartment.

Lena was telling me some amusing piece of gossip about one of her
clients, when I interrupted her and picked up the flower basket.

'This old chap will be proposing to you some day, Lena.'

'Oh, he has--often!' she murmured.

'What! After you've refused him?'

'He doesn't mind that. It seems to cheer him to mention the subject.
Old men are like that, you know. It makes them feel important to think
they're in love with somebody.'

'The colonel would marry you in a minute. I hope you won't marry some
old fellow; not even a rich one.' Lena shifted her pillows and looked up
at me in surprise.

'Why, I'm not going to marry anybody. Didn't you know that?'

'Nonsense, Lena. That's what girls say, but you know better. Every
handsome girl like you marries, of course.'

She shook her head. 'Not me.'

'But why not? What makes you say that?' I persisted.

Lena laughed.

'Well, it's mainly because I don't want a husband. Men are all right
for friends, but as soon as you marry them they turn into cranky ol