protest his matutinal ringings were wont
to call forth when Dorothy had been a gay and frivolous debutante. The
enforced quiet of her mother's prolonged illness, and the sojourn in the
retirement of a hill sanitarium, had made of her a very different
creature from the gaudy little night-bird of yore. The experiences
through which she had passed, their anxiety and pain, had left her
nature sweetened and deepened; had given her new sympathies and
understandings. Now her laugh was just as clear--but its ring of light
coquetry was gone.

"Of course, I'll take a walk with you," came her answer,--"if you'll
stop for me. I'm quite a pedestrian, you know. I _had_ to take some sort
of a cure in sheer self-defense, up there in the wilds, so I decided on
fresh air--and now it's a habit. I'll be ready."

Teddy walked rapidly, his heart singing. He had quite forgotten his
errand in the anticipated joy of seeing her. If he thought at all of the
painting, it was an unformulated regret that no living artist could do
Dorothy justice, or ever hope to transfer to canvas any true semblance
of her many perfections.

She joined him in the hallway of her home, called back a last happy
good-by to her mother, and passed with him into the silver and crystal
morning light. She was simply dressed in a dark tailor suit, with a
little hat and sensible shoes--a very different silhouette from that of
the girl who left her room only in time to keep her luncheon
appointments. He looked at her with approval and laughed happily.

"Hello, Country!--how are the cows to-day?"

"Fine," she answered. "All boiled and sterilized, milked by electricity,
manicured by steam and dehorned by absent treatment, sir, she said--sir,
she said."

"May I go with you into your highly sanitary barnyard, my pretty maid?"
he asked seriously.

"Not unless you take a bath in carbolic solution, are vaccinated twice,
and wear a surgeon's uniform, sir, she said."

"But, I'm going to marry you, my pretty maid." The words were out before
he could check them. He blushed furiously. To propose in a nursery rhyme
was something that shocked his sense of fitness. He was amazed to find
that he meant what he said in just the very way he had said it.

But Dorothy took his answer as part of their early morning springtime
madness.

"Nobody asked you to be farm inspector, sir, she said," she replied
promptly.

But he was silent. His own words had choked him completely. She looked
a