in them. He talked to me nearly
all the time. He thought for a moment that he knew the baroness--at
least, he stared at her at first and seemed surprised. But it turned out
that she was only like someone he knew. She had evidently never seen him
before. It is a great pleasure to me to talk to that young man," the
princess went on, while Anna ate her toast.

"So it is to me," said Anna.

"I have met many people in my life, and have often wondered at the
dearth of nice ones--how few there are that one likes to be with and
wishes to see again and again. Axel is one of the few, decidedly."

"So he is," agreed Anna.

"There is goodness written on every line of his face."

"Oh, he has the kindest face. And so strong. I feel that if anything
happened here, anything dreadful, that he would make it right again at
once. He would mend us if we got smashed, and build us up again if we
got burned, and protect us, this houseful of lone women, if ever anybody
tried to run away with us." And Anna nodded reassuringly at the
princess, and took another piece of toast "That is how I feel about
him," she said. "So agreeably certain, not only of his willingness to
help, but of his power to do it." Talking about Axel she quite forgot
the apparition of the baroness that she had just seen. He was so kind,
so good, so strong. How much she admired strength of purpose,
independence, the character that was determined to find its happiness in
doing its best.

"If I had a daughter," said the princess, filling Anna's cup, "she
should marry Axel Lohm."

"If _I_ had a daughter," said Anna, "she should marry him, so yours
couldn't. I wouldn't even ask her if she liked it. I'd be so sure that
it was a good thing for her that I'd just say: 'My dear, I have chosen
my son-in-law. Get your hat, and come to church and marry him.' And
there'd be an end of _that_."

The princess felt that it was an unprofitable employment, trying to help
on Axel's cause. She could not but see what he thought of Anna; and
after the touching manner of widows, was convinced of the superiority of
marriage, as a means of real happiness for a woman, over any and every
other form of occupation. Yet whenever she talked of him she was met by
the same hearty agreement and frank enthusiasm, the very words being
taken out of her mouth and her own praises of him doubled and trebled.
It was a promising friendship, but it was a singularly unpromising
prelude to love.

"Please make