ss shopping to do, but there was time enough
for all that. Now she would walk, and get her bearings, and consider
that one might live well in a city. The brick sidewalks seemed at once
strange and familiar; she had known the brown-stone streets all her
life. Once they had seemed her own, the only place worth walking in; now
they were a poor apology, indeed, for shady lanes and broad sunny roads
along which the feet trod or the wheel spun, winged by "the joy of mere
living." She passed the house where her childhood had been spent, and
paused to look up at the tall windows, in loving thought of the dear
father who had made that early home so bright and full of cheer. Dear
Father! There was his smoking-room window, where he used to sit and read
aloud to her, so many happy hours. How he would dislike those heavy
brocade curtains; he used to thunder, almost as loud as Colonel Ferrers,
about curtains that kept out the blessed sunshine. How--the house was a
corner one, and at this moment, as Hildegarde stood gazing up at the
windows, a gentleman turned the corner, and ran plump into her.

"Upon my soul," said the gentleman, with great violence, "it is a most
extraordinary thing that a human being should turn himself into a post
for the express purpose of--I beg your pardon, madam. I was not
conscious that I was addressing a lady! Can I serve you in any way?
Command me, I beg of you!"

The moment Hildegarde caught the sound of the gentleman's voice, she
turned her head away, so that he could not see her face; and now she
spoke over her shoulder.

"A place in thy memory, dearest--sir, is all that I ask at thy hands. It
is hard to be forgotten so soon, so utterly!"

"What! what! what! what!" said the Colonel. "Who! who! why--why the
mischief will you not turn your head round, young woman? There is only
one young woman in the world who would address me in this manner, and
she is a hundred miles away. Now, in the name of all that is elfish,
Hildegarde Grahame, what are you doing here?"

Hildegarde turned round, her eyes full of happy laughter, and took her
friend's arm.

"And in the name of all that is occult, and necromantic, and
Rosicrucian, Colonel Ferrers, what are _you_ doing here?" she asked. "I
thought you were in Washington."

"I was, till last night!" the Colonel replied. "We have seen all the
sights, the boy and I, and now we have come to see the sights here on
our way home. Well! well! and the first sight I see i