fashionable
pattern of tweeds halted opposite the vehicle holding my driver. I was
quite satisfied with Mr S. Messre's methods, though his initial, as
Andrew averred, might very well have stood for silly.

The golfing cap came off the heavy red locks, while the bright brown
ones under the smart felt hat with the pom-poms, bobbed in response,
and Mr S. Messre came upon me again, wiping his fingers on a soiled
towel, and tugging each one separately after the manner of childhood.

"Did you want a tooth pulled?"

"Well, I wished to consult you dentally, but not in public," I said,
as two urchins came in and listened with all their features.

"Well, hold hard a bit and I'll take you inside."

I held or rather sat hard on the tall hard chair, and heard Ernest
explaining to Dawn that he had been swimming in the sun, which made
his face as red as his hair, for he gave her to understand that such
was not his usual complexion. His red locks, very dark and handsome,
which lent him a distinction and endeared him to me, were such a
sensitive point with him that his mind was continually reverting to
them, and that audacious Dawn unkindly replied--

"It wouldn't do to be all red. If my hair were red I'd dye it green or
blue, but red I would not have."

"But it's a good serviceable colour for a _man_," meekly protested the
knight.

"Perhaps for a _fighting_ man," retorted the young minx with no
contradictory twinkle in her eye; "but I could never trust a
red-headed person: all that I know are deceitful."

I was dismayed. How would a gentle young athlete weather this? To a
perky little man of more wits than muscle, or to a gay old Lothario,
it would have been an incentive to the chase, but I feared Dawn was
too horribly, uncompromisingly given to speaking what she felt,
irrespective of grace, to expand this young Romeo to love; but much
merciless fire will be stood from beauty, and he made a valiant
defence.

"There are exceptions to every rule, Miss Dawn. I never was known as
deceitful; ask any one who knows me."

"I don't know any one who knows you."

"Ask your friend inside, I think she'll give me a good character."

"Quite the reverse. If you heard what she says about you, you'd never
be seen in Noonoon again;" but this assertion was made with such a
roguish smile on eye and lip that Ernest took up a closer position by
stepping into the gutter and placing one foot on the step of the sulky
and a corresponding hand o