good fellow!"

When Dawson and Evelyn had gone, Schuyler proceeded to get rid of the
children. He gave them fifty cents apiece, and said that if he didn't
see them or hear them for half an hour they could keep the money.

"Are you trying to get this room all to yourself?" asked Lucy. "Do you
want Archie and me to vanish, too?"

"No," said Schuyler; "much as you and Archie may wish to, I want
nothing of the kind. Lucy, I think you'd better telegraph John to come
home, don't you?"

"I've told Schuyler, Lucy," I said.

"And that's a good thing," said Schuyler; "because I don't have to take
sides. I like you all. You and Archie _have_ to take your side, and
John has to take his, naturally."

Lucy, her hands folded in her lap, looked bored and annoyed.

"A lot of talk isn't going to help any," she said.

"For certain reasons, Lucy," said Schuyler, "you and Archie are just
now as blind as two bats. You don't see what you are doing, and you
don't see what you are up against."

"I've only one life," said Lucy, "and it's my own."

"But it isn't," said Schuyler; "you gave it to John. I'd be mightily
hurt and shocked to find out that you were an Indian giver."

"John will give my life back to me when he knows."

"Well, find out if he will or not. Send for him. Tell him what's
happened."

"I think that would be best, Lucy," I said.

"Then, of course, I'll send," she said. "But----"

"John, you know," said Schuyler, "may not take you two very seriously.
He may think that Lucy's feelings for you, Archie, are just a passing
whim. Upon the grounds of his own experience with Lucy, he would be
within his rights to feel that way. Why not," his face brightened into
a sort of cheerfulness, "why not test yourselves a little? You go
north, Archie, and wait around, and then, after a while, if you and
Lucy feel the same, it will be time enough to tell John. It's all been
too sudden for you to feel sure of yourselves. It isn't as if neither
of you had ever been in love before and gotten over it. As a matter of
cold fact, you've both been tried before now and found wanting. So I
think you ought to go slow--for John's sake. He's the fellow that's
been tried and that hasn't been found wanting."

It was obvious that Lucy did not like her brother's suggestion at all,
for she rose suddenly, her hands clenched, and exclaimed:

"Oh, you don't understand at all. How can I go on living with a man I
don't love? How