your pardon again. You know it
was in the dark, and mine was an honest mistake."

"I will if you will tell me one thing."

"What is it?"

"Have you really got a camera with you?"

"If I had I should take a picture of you and not of Mr. Grayson."

Harley remained awhile longer, and Miss Morgan's treatment remained
familiar and somewhat disconcerting, rather like the manner of an elder
sister to her young brother than of a girl to a man whom she had known
only two or three hours. When he rose to leave, she again offered him
her hand with perfect coolness. Harley, in a perfunctory manner,
expressed his regret that he was not likely to see her again, as he was
to leave the next day with Mr. Grayson. The provoking twinkle appeared
again in the corner of her eyes.

"I don't intend that you shall forget me, Mr. Harley," she said,
"because you _are_ to see me again. When you come to Washington in
search of news, I shall be there as the second lady of the land--Aunt
Anna will be first."

"Oh, of course, I forgot that," said Harley, but he was not sure that
she had Washington in mind, remembering Mrs. Grayson's assertion that
she did not always mean what she said nor say what she meant.

The night was quite dark, and when he had gone a few yards Harley
stopped and looked back at the house. He felt a distinct sense of
relief, because he was gone from the presence of the mountain girl who
was not of his kind, and whom he did not know how to take; being a man,
he could not retort upon her in her own fashion, and she was able to
make him feel cheap.

The drawing-room was still lighted, and he saw the Idaho girl pass in
front of one of the low windows, her figure completely outlined by the
luminous veil. It seemed to him to express a singular, flexible
grace--perhaps the result of mountain life--but he was loath to admit
it, as she troubled him. Harley, although young, had been in many lands
and among many people. He had seen many women who were beautiful, and
some who were brilliant, but it had been easy to forget every one of
them; they hardly made a ripple in the stream of his work, and often it
was an effort to recall them. He had expected to dismiss this Idaho girl
in the same manner, but she would not go, and he was intensely annoyed
with himself.

He went to the telegraph-office, wrote and filed his despatch, and then,
lighting a cigar, strolled slowly through the streets. It was not eleven
o'clock, but it seemed t