ly to do anything that was very dangerous or
very difficult."

"I dare say," I muttered, biting my lips with vexation, and avoiding
Dorothy's laughing eyes. I was a mere puppy, or I should have known that
a woman never praises openly the man she loves.

"I am sure you will admire him when you meet him," she continued, "as I
am determined you shall do this very night. He is a neighbor, you know,
and I'll wager that when you come to live at Riverview, you will be
forever riding over to Mount Vernon."

"Oh, doubtless!" I said, between my teeth, and I longed to have Mr.
Washington by the throat. "How comes it I heard nothing of him when I was
at Riverview?"

"'Tis only since last year he has been there," she answered. "The estate
belonged to his elder brother, Lawrence, who died July a year ago, and
Major Washington has since then been with his mother, helping her in its
management. Before that time, he had been over the mountains surveying
all that western country, and then to the West Indies, where he had the
smallpox, because he would not break a promise to dine with a family
where it was. But what is the matter? You seem quite ill."

"It is nothing," I said, after a moment. "It was the smallpox which
killed my father and my mother."

"Pardon me," and her hand was on mine for an instant. Indeed, the shudder
which always shook me whenever I heard that dread infection mentioned had
already passed. "He has the rank of major," she continued, hoping
doubtless to distract my thoughts, "because he has been appointed
adjutant-general of one of the districts, but somehow we rarely call him
major, for he says he does not want the title until he has done something
to deserve it."

"He seems a very extraordinary man," I said gloomily, "to have done so
much and to be yet scarce twenty-two."

"He is an extraordinary man," cried Dorothy, "as you will say when you
meet him. A word of caution, Tom," she added, seeing my desperate plight,
and relenting a little. "Say nothing to him of the tender passion, for he
has lately been crossed in love, and is very sore about it. A certain
Mistress Cary, to whom he was paying court, hath rejected him, and
wounded him as much in his self-esteem as in his love, which, I fancy,
was not great, but which, on that account, he is anxious to have appear
even greater, as is the way with men."

"Trust me," said I, with a great lightening of the heart; "I shall be
very careful not to wound him, Dor