s, Molly, don't knock the town down like that! Let 'em have
more than a week to get used to this white rag of a dress you've been
waving in their faces for the last few days. Go slow!"

"I've been going so slow for so many years that I've turned around and
I'm going fast backward," I said with a blush that I couldn't help.

"Help! Let my kinship protect me!" exclaimed Tom in alarm, and he
pretended to move an inch away from me.

"Yes," I said slowly and as I looked out of the corner of my eyes from
under the lashes that Tom himself had once told me were "too long and
black to be tidy," I saw that he was in a condition to get the full
shock. "If anybody wakes up this town it will be I," I said as I flung
down the gauntlet with a high head.

"Here, Molly, here are the keys of my office, and the spark-plug to the
Hup; you can cut off a lock of my hair, and if Judy has got a cake I'll
eat it out of your hands. Shall it be California or Nova Scotia? And I
prefer _my_ bride served in light gray tweed." Tom really is
adorable and I let him snuggle up just one cousinly second, then we both
laughed and began to plan what Tom was horrible enough to call the
resurrection razoo. But I kept that delicious rose-embroidered treasure
all to myself. I wanted him to meet it entirely unprepared.

I was glad we had both got over our excitement and were sitting
decorously at several inches' distance apart when the judge drew the
grays up to the gate and we both went down to the sidewalk to ask him
and the lovely long lady to come in. They couldn't; but we stood and
talked to them long enough for Mrs. Johnson to get a good look at us
from across the street and I was afraid I would find Aunt Adeline in a
faint when I went into the house.

Miss Chester was delightfully gracious about the dinner--I almost called
it the debut dinner--and the expression on the judge's face when he
accepted! I was glad she was sitting sidewise to him and couldn't see.
Some women like to make other women unhappy, but I think it is best for
you to keep them blissfully unconscious until you get what you want.
Anyway, I like that girl all over and I can't see that her neck is so
absolutely impossibly flowery. However, I think she might have been a
little more considerate about discussing Alfred's London triumph over
the Italian mission. As a punishment I let Tom put his arm around my
waist as we stood watching them drive off and then was sorry for the
left gray