back to
the fire and we'll join you. If you are very good we'll bring you a
special treat by-and-by."

"That settles it," said the doctor, and led the retreat, but not without a
backward glance at the little kitchen.

Juliet had gone into the dining-room with a trayful of glass and silver.
Rachel Redding was plunging half a dozen white towels into a pan of
steaming water. Barnes stood an instant, staring hard at the slender
figure in the white pinafore, the round young arms gleaming in the
lamplight--then he turned to follow the others. There are some pictures
which linger long in a man's memory; why, he can hardly tell. With all his
varied experiences Dr. Roger Barnes had never before discovered how
attractive a background a well-kept kitchen makes for a beautiful woman,
so that she be there mistress of the situation. Long after he had gone
back to the fire his absent eyes, while the others talked, were studying
the--to him--unaccustomed and singularly charming scene he had just left
in the kitchen.

When Juliet and Rachel came in at length they found a plan afoot for their
entertainment. Wayne Carey was standing at the window showing cause why
the whole party should go out and coast upon the hill near by.

"You admit," he argued with Anthony, "that you know where we can get a
pair of bobs--and if you can't I'll bribe some of those youngsters out
there to let us have theirs. The storm has stopped; the boys have swept
off the whole hill, I should judge, by the way their track shines again
under the moonlight. I haven't had a good coast since I left college."

He turned to Juliet. "Will you go?" he asked coaxingly.

"Of course we will," promised Juliet. "Tony wants to go--he's just
enjoying making you tease. As for the doctor----"

"If my right hand has not forgot her cunning," he agreed.

In ten minutes the party was off. A young matron of five months' standing
is not so materially changed from the girl she used to be that she can
fail to be the gayest of company, perhaps with the more zest that the old
good times seem a bit far away already and she is glad to bring them
back.

As for the real girl of the party, in this case it chanced to be a country
lass who had been away to school and half-way through college, had been
brought home by love and duty to some elderly people who needed her, and
had known many hours of stifled longing for the sort of companionship with
which she had grown happily familiar.

Ma