y mind," she smiled. "Nothing but your
aunt. Thank goodness."

"A weight off your mind!" Enid repeated. "But you didn't know me."

"No, but I knew you were a young thing in trouble, and that 'Her' gave
me many a bad minute."

Enid's fingers reached gropingly toward her new-found friend. Their
two hands clasped and held fast.

"Auntie took me when I was a little girl. I was an orphan. She's been
everything to me, and she adores me. But she doesn't like Tommy."

"Why not?"

"She hasn't anything really against him except that he's poor. It
would kill her to have me leave her to marry him. I can't bring myself
to do it. And yet I can't bring myself to give Tommy up." She was
crying in earnest now, and the clasp of Persis' hand tightened.

"You can't and you oughtn't. There's too much sacrifice of love these
days. Young fellows instead of having homes of their own are
supporting two or three grown-up sisters and getting crabbed and
bitter. And girls the Lord meant for wives and mothers stay at home
because the old folks don't want to spare them. Nine times out of ten
it's like Abraham sacrificing Isaac, and there's a he-goat somewhere
round in the bushes that would do just as well."

"But it would seem so dreadfully ungrateful to disappoint her," gasped
Enid Randolph with the air of one who longs to be disproved. "After
she's done everything for me."

"Bless you, child, if you love and are sure of him, the mother who bore
you wouldn't have a right to say no. And what's more, if you're
sensible enough to go your own way, she'll probably end up by thinking
he next thing to made the world and taking all the credit for the
match. You're twenty-one, of course."

"Twenty-three."

"Then I wouldn't have any more of this underhanded business. Talk it
out with your aunt, and unless she can show you good reasons for giving
up your young man, you've got the best reason in the world for taking
him."

Enid deliberated. Then very slowly she tore her letter to bits.

"I was saying good-by to him forever--for the twenty-ninth time." She
smiled somewhat palely. "But I rather think, Miss Persis Dale, that
I'll take your advice."

CHAPTER XVIII

A STALLED ENGINE

"Well, I don't expect to be any nearer flying till I get to Heaven and
they fit me to a pair of wings. I might try a little jaunt in an
air-ship some day, but I don't feel as if I'd relish that for a steady
diet. For this world, an au