has been idle a minute. I've been
fishing all day with Lanse and Fred and Celia. Andy, do you know what I
think? I admit I didn't think it till Lanse put it into my head, but I
believe he's right. Fred----"

"Is going to want Celia? Of course. That was a foregone conclusion from
the start."

"Andy Churchill, you weren't so discerning as all that, when not even I
thought it was serious with either of them! Celia's had so many
admirers, and turned them all aside so coolly--and Mr. Frederic Forester
is such an accomplished person at paying attentions--how could I think
it meant anything? But Lanse insists Celia is different from what she
ever was before, and I don't know but he's right."

"To be sure he's right. Next to you, I never saw a more attractive young
person than Celia. What a charming colour you have, child! To be sure,
you have burned the tip of that small Greek nose a very little, but I
find even that adorable. Charlotte, stop pinching my arm. If you're half
as glad to have me get here as I am to arrive, you're pretty happy. I
laid stern commands on Mrs. Fields not to telephone, unless it were a
matter of absolute necessity, so I'm pretty sure of not being
disturbed."

They found supper laid on the piazza, and enjoyed it with keen
appetites. Afterward they spent an hour drifting on the river, followed
by a long and delightful evening on the lawn at the river bank. Celia
and Lanse picked the strings of violin and viola, and the others sang.
Doctor Forester, in his white clothes lay stretched on a rustic seat,
and professed himself to be having "the time of his life."

"I don't think the rest of us are far behind you," declared Lanse. "If
you people had been digging away at law in a hot old office you'd think
this was Paradise."

Evelyn, looking out over the moonlit river, drew a little sigh which she
meant nobody to hear, but Jeff divined it, and whispered, under cover of
an extravaganza from Just in regard to the night, the company, and the
occasion, "You're coming again next summer, you know. And all winter
we'll write about it--shall we?"

"Do you think you will have time to write?" she asked.

"Have time! I should say I would make time," he murmured. "Think I'm
going to stand having this sort of thing cut off short? I guess
not--unless--you're the one who hasn't time. And even then I don't think
I could be kept from boring you with letters."

"I shall certainly want to hear what you all are doing,