idea you were anywhere about. I suppose I'm greedy
but these did seem lovelier than mine. This is Lilac Sunday and I
thought--perhaps nobody told you--that as long as you had so many you
wouldn't mind--I hope you don't think--"

She was so very evidently bothered over the whole affair, so
disconcerted, she who was always so coolly dignified, that he laughed
with boyish delight.

"Oh--don't explain, I understand," he begged.

The red in Nan's cheeks deepened. She stiffened and half turned away.

"Goodness," she exclaimed to no one in particular, "how I _do_ dislike
ministers. They always understand everything. You just can't tell
them anything. How I loathe them! They're insufferable."

It was his turn to look a little startled and embarrassed.

"But you don't have to like me as a minister. I don't want to be
_your_ minister."

She looked up to see just what he meant. But he seemed to have
forgotten her, for the smile had gone from his eyes and though he
looked at her she knew that he didn't see her; that he was looking
beyond her at some one, something else. When he spoke it was with a
winning gravity and a wistfulness that Nanny tried not to hear.

"I miss my mother more than any one here can guess. Grandma Wentworth
is wonderful. She is so wise and good and I love her. But my mother
was young and gay and very beautiful. She played and laughed and
talked with me. She was the loveliest soul I ever knew. You are very
much like her. I have wanted you for a friend. I never had a sister
but if I could have had I should have asked for a girl like you."

Oh, Nanny sensed the pitiful, childish loneliness of that plea! The
wistfulness of the boy stabbed through her really tender heart. But
Nanny Ainslee was a joyous, laughter-loving creature. And the idea of
this boy whom already she half loved asking her to be his _friend_, his
_sister_! Oh, it was childishly funny. How her father would chuckle
if he knew that she who had dismissed so many suitors with platonic
friendliness and sisterly solicitude was now being offered that same
platonic friendliness and brotherly love. It was too much for Nanny's
sense of humor!

So Nanny giggled. She giggled disgracefully and could not stop
herself,--giggled even though she knew that the tall boy beside her was
flushing a painful red and slowly freezing into a hurt and painful
silence. But she could not save herself or him.

"You had better let me cut y