told himself, when
he found only Dexter Allison with Caleb, the next afternoon near six.
And on a sudden thought his eyes went roving around the room then,
looking for Archibald Wickersham; but Miss Sarah gave him no time for a
protracted scrutiny.

"Your room is ready, Stephen," she told him, and steered him toward the
stairs. "You have an hour in which to dress--and you know already that
I am old-maidenishly strict."

Surely Archibald Wickersham was the other guest whom they were
expecting. Allison's very presence argued that. Yet Steve's nose
played him a startling trick as he mounted upward. He could have sworn
that he smelled that faint perfume which always made him remember, now,
his first letter from her; had he not been afraid to hope he would have
been positive that there was a flurry of skirts retreating above him.
But he knew that she could not have come. He knew it! And then,
three-quarters of an hour later, when he had dressed and turned again
to the stairway, she was there at the foot of the flight, waiting for
him to appear. In a little low pink satin gown that made rounded her
slenderness--made her appear even smaller than she was--she gave him an
elaborate courtesy from the main floor, and flung up at him her
laughter.

"Merry Christmas, Sir Galahad," she called.

Just as he had paused there a half-score of years before, Stephen
O'Mara paused now, with Caleb and Miss Sarah again gazing up at him.
It was the first time Sarah Hunter had seen the grown-up Steve in
conventional black and white; her emotions were much the same as they
had been on that remoter day. But Steve did not even see her glowing
face below him in that instant, nor Caleb's, nor that of Allison
either, who watching Steve's eyes, had suddenly ceased to smile. Caleb
knew what his sister's thoughts were, however, for he was recalling
that black velvet suit with silver buttons himself. While Steve and
Barbara were shaking hands he gained her ear in whispered admiration.

"Sarah," he commented, "Sarah, you are clever!"

Miss Sarah was on the point of taking Dexter Allison's arm to lead the
way to table. Her reply was tuned to Caleb's ear alone.

"She had thought of him in terms of blue flannel and corduroy long
enough," she said. "If you please, Dexter--Stephen, do you and Barbara
want any dinner?"

Those two were still shaking hands. Steve, who was only dimly aware of
the fact that Garry and Fat Joe had arrived, the l