nnie! why, that's
positively silly--ha, ha, ha!"

"I don't see how, Nan."

"My dear Con! Isn't his absence equally and perfectly innocent whether
he couldn't come or wouldn't come? But an explanation sent!--by
courier!--to--to shorten--ah, ha, ha!--to shorten our agony! Why, Con,
wouldn't you have thought better of him than that? H-oh, me! What a
man's 'bound to be' I suppose he's bound to be. What is the precious
explanation?"

With melting eyes Constance shook her head. "You don't deserve to hear
it," she replied. Her tears came: "My little sister, I'm on the man's
side in this affair!"

"That's not good of you," murmured Anna.

"I don't claim to be good. But there's one thing, Nan Callender, I never
did; I never chained up my lover to see if he'd stay chained. When
Steve--"

"Oh-h! Oh-h!" panted Anna, "you're too cruel! Hilary Kincaid wears no
chain of mine!"

"Oh, yes, he does! He's broken away, but he's broken away, chain and
all, to starve and perish, as one look into his face would show you!"

"He doesn't show his face. He sends--"

"An explanation. Yes. Which first you scorn and then consent to hear."

"Don't scorn _me_, Connie. What's the explanation?"

"It's this: he's been sent back to those Mobile fortifications--received
the order barely in time to catch the boat by going instantly. Nan, the
Valcours' house is found to stand right on their proposed line, and he's
gone to decide whether the line may be changed or the house must be
demolished."

Anna rose, twined an arm in her sister's and with her paced the chamber.
"How perfectly terrible!" she murmured, their steps ceasing and her eyes
remote in meditation. "Poor Flora! Oh, the poor old lady! And oh, oh,
poor Flora!--But, Con! The line will be changed! He--you know what the
boys call him!"

"Yes, but there's the trouble. He's no one lady's man. Like Steve, he's
so absolutely fair--"

"Connie, I tell you it's a strange line he won't change for Flora
Valcour!"

"Now, Nan Callender! The line will go where it ought to go. By the by,
Charlie says neither Flora nor her grandmother knows the house is in
danger. Of course, if it is harmed, the harm will be paid for."

"Oh, paid for!"

"Why, Nan, I'm as sorry for them as you. But _I_ don't forget to be
sorry for Hilary Kincaid too."

"Connie"--walk resumed, speaker's eyes on the floor--"if you'd only see
that to me he's merely very interesting--entertaining--nothing more
whatever--I'd like