mmon woman and does enjoy life on all sides. And it is curious the
way she picks up knowledge everywhere. I dare say she sometimes mentions
facts about her own country to consuls and ministers abroad that they
have scarcely heard of," declared Mrs. Dayton.

Mr. Warfield gave a little sniff and a curl of the lip that seemed to
run all over his face in disapprobation, because he could find no
trenchant sentence to apply to Mrs. Van Dorn. But Helen glanced at her
hostess with a lovely grateful light more eloquent than words.

When they rose she lingered. "I ought to go out and dry the dishes for
Joanna," the girl said laughingly.

"Indeed, you will do no such thing," was the quick reply. "And let me
whisper a secret in your ear, though I don't know as it need be that.
Mrs. Van Dorn wrote me a note, asking me to invite you here and keep you
as much of the time as Aunt Jane would be willing to spare you. And she
inclosed a check. I'd been ready enough to do it just for the pleasure."

"She is very generous," said Helen, much moved.

"And some people think her mean. She is unduly exact, but I guess the
world would be better if more people paid their just debts instead of
buying you a dollar gift when they owed you forty or fifty. But run out
on the porch and talk to Mr. Warfield. He came purposely to see you.
I'll be out and join the fray presently," her eyes overflowing with an
amused light. "If you were older I should say--there, run along."

She checked herself just in time. It was on the tip of her tongue to
add--"he is half in love with you." But the girl's face was so
innocently frank that it would have been both ill-bred and cruel to
suggest such a thing.

On the whole, it was a pleasant evening, though Helen was not a little
puzzled by several things in Mr. Warfield's demeanor, and his resolutely
keeping to his opinion that she would have been better off at the High
School. Some way would have opened for her, he was confident.

Still, he gave her the most cordial good wishes. She had the making of a
splendid girl and woman in her. He took great credit in the
consciousness that he had seen this, and roused her from a commonplace
existence, for now, whatever happened, she could not be commonplace; as
if, indeed, the every-day lives were not often doing heroic and lovely
deeds in their every-day sphere.

He was going for nine weeks to a summer college term, on the borders of
a beautiful lake, where he would have