ren't you?"

The assumption of his vassalage somehow stirred a little antagonism, but
before he could answer she was off again.

"Well, a jolly long wait you'll have, too. Doris is splashing around
among the rouge and powder like Romp in a puddle."

Her own cheeks needed no such encouragement, he thought, laughing back
at her through the pure infection of her high spirits.

"I like you; you're all right," she said, surveying him with her head on
one side like Romp, the terrier, who came sniffing up to him in the
friendliest way. "You're not like a lot of these fashion plates that
come in on tiptoes. Say, that was a bully tackle you made in that
Harvard game."

He was down on one knee rubbing the shaggy coat of the terrier. He
looked up.

"Oh you saw that, did you?"

"Yep! I guess there wasn't much left of that fellow! Dad said that was
the finest tackle he ever saw."

"It shook me up all right," he said, grinning.

"Well, if Dad likes you and Romp likes you, you must be some account,"
she continued, camping on the rug and seizing triumphantly the stubby
tail. "Dad's strong for you!"

Bojo settled on the edge of the sofa, watching the furious encounter
which took place for the possession of the strategic point.

"I suppose you're going to marry Doris," she said in a moment of calm,
while Romp made good his escape.

Bojo felt himself flushing under the direct child-like gaze.

"I should be very flattered if Doris--"

"Oh, don't talk that way," she said with a fling of her shoulders.
"That's like all the others. Tell me, are all New York men such hopeless
ninnies? Lord, I'm going to have a dreary time of it." She looked at him
critically. "One thing I like about you; you don't wear spats."

"I suppose you're home for the wedding," he asked curiously, "or are you
through with the boarding-school?"

"Didn't you hear about this?" she said with a touch to her shortened
hair. "They wanted me to come out and I said I wouldn't come out. And
when they said I should come out, I said to myself, I'll just fix them
so I can't come out, and I hacked off all my hair. That's why they sent
me off to Coventry for the summer. I'd have hacked it off again, but
Dad cut up so I let it grow, and now the plaguey old fashion has gotten
around to bobbed hair. What do you think of that?"

"So you don't want to come out?" he answered.

"What for? To be nice to a lot of old frumps you don't like, to dress up
and drink tea and l