d; "but if you'll only promise
to go away at once, I'll bring you everything in the house."

"In that house," exclaimed Lathrop, dramatically, "there's only one
thing that I desire, and I want that so badly that 'life holds no charm
without you.'"

Miss Farrar regarded him steadily.

"Do you intend to drive me away from my own door, or will you go?"

Lathrop picked his wheel out of the dust.

"Good-by," he said. "I'll come back when you have made up your mind."

In vexation Miss Farrar stamped her foot upon the path.

"I _have_ made up my mind!" she protested.

"Then," returned Lathrop, "I'll come back when you have changed it."

He made a movement as though to ride away, but much to Miss Farrar's
dismay, hastily dismounted. "On second thoughts," he said, "it isn't
right for me to leave you. The woods are full of tramps and hangers-on
of the army. You're not safe. I can watch this road from here as well as
from anywhere else, and at the same time I can guard you."

To the consternation of Miss Farrar he placed his bicycle against the
fence, and, as though preparing for a visit, leaned his elbows upon it.

"I do not wish to be rude," said Miss Farrar, "but you are annoying me.
I have spent fifteen summers in Massachusetts, and I have never seen a
tramp. I need no one to guard me."

"If not you," said Lathrop easily, "then the family silver. And think of
your jewels, and your mother's jewels. Think of yourself in a house
filled with jewels, and entirely surrounded by hostile armies! My duty
is to remain with you."

Miss Farrar was so long in answering, that Lathrop lifted his head and
turned to look. He found her frowning and gazing intently into the
shadow of the woods, across the road. When she felt his eyes upon her
she turned her own guiltily upon him. Her cheeks were flushed and her
face glowed with some unusual excitement.

"I wish," she exclaimed breathlessly--"I wish," she repeated, "the Reds
would take you prisoner!"

"Take me where?" asked Lathrop.

"Take you anywhere!" cried Miss Farrar. "You should be ashamed to talk
to me when you should be looking for the enemy!"

"I am _waiting_ for the enemy," explained Lathrop. "It's the same
thing."

Miss Farrar smiled vindictively. Her eyes shone.

"You need not wait long," she said.

There was a crash of a falling stone wall, and of parting bushes, but
not in time to give Lathrop warning. As though from the branches of the
trees opposite two so