spent the sultry August evening upon the porch
in the semi-darkness was near to breaking up, Leaver came to Charlotte
and took his place beside her. When she left the house he was with her,
and the two crossed the street and went in at the hedge gate together.

"May I stay a very little while?" he asked. And when she assented he
added, "Shall we find the bench in your garden?"

"Do you know that bench?" she questioned, surprised.

"I spent many hours upon it before you came, and during the days when I
was not getting about much. I listened to the reading of two books,
lounging there. So it seems like a familiar spot to me."

"It is my favourite resting place. I am sorry you were driven away by my
coming. You and Miss Mathewson would have been very welcome there, all
the rest of the summer, if I had known."

"Thank you. But I have passed the invalid stage and am not being treated
as a patient. I read for myself, at present, and tramp the country,
instead of sitting on benches, anywhere. It's a great improvement."

"I am very glad."

Charlotte let him lead the way to the retreat under the apple-tree, and
he proved his knowledge of it by stopping now and then to hold aside
hindering branches of shrubbery, and to lift for her a certain heavily
leafed bough which drooped across the path, but which would hardly have
been discerned in the summer starlight by one not familiar with its
position.

"It would be a pity to tear that gown," he remarked, as the last barrier
was passed. "It occurred to me, as I looked at you to-night, that it was
one I had seen you wear in Baltimore, last winter. Am I right?"

"Last winter, and the winter before, and even the winter before that, if
you had known me so long," she answered, with a gay little laugh. "I am
so fond of it I shall not discard it until it can no longer be mended."

"You are wise. I believe it is hardly the attitude of the modern woman
toward dress of any sort, but it might well be. We never tire of Nature,
though she wears the same costume season after season."

"Her frocks don't fray at the edges--or when they do she turns them such
gorgeous colours that we don't notice they are getting worn."

"Aren't there some rough edges on this bench? Please take this end; I
think I recall that it is smoother than the other."

"Thank you. One good tear, and even Granny's needle couldn't make me
whole again."

He bent over to pick up a scarf of silver gauze which had slippe