go crooked.
Is Eagle's rich aunt likely to die?"

"Well, yes, she is," Diana admitted. "She's very old, you know. She's
had a third stroke of paralysis. If Eagle could have got leave he would
have gone to her, but that was out of the question as things are."

"Did he tell you about her, or was it some one else who gave you the
news?"

"It was some one else, of course. Naturally I wanted to make sure, so
I--sympathized with him on his aunt's illness. He had only just heard
about it, himself. He's always been fond of her, and he said he couldn't
have had the heart to come to a dance, if it hadn't been his last night,
and the only way to see me before he left for Texas. But he told me that
Mrs. Cabot's death would make him comparatively a rich man. Those were
the words he used. I don't think he's sure how much he'll get. It was
from Kitty I heard what Mrs. Cabot is likely to leave."

"And as 'likely' isn't the same as 'certain,' you're hanging fire till
she's dead," I explained Diana to herself.

"You make me out heaps worse than I am," she reproached me. "If I
haven't given an absolutely definite answer to Eagle March or Sidney
Vandyke, it's--it's--because of this expedition they're both going on.
They may get some chance to distinguish themselves. You're such a
practical little person that you can't realize the romantic sort of
feeling I have about such things. If I marry a man who isn't of my own
country, I should like him to be a great hero, whom every one would read
about and admire. I've told each of them to work, and do his best for my
sake."

"There'll probably be no opportunity for anything heroic
in such an expedition as this," said I, living up to the
reputation--ill-deserved--for practicality, which Di wished
to thrust on me in contrast with herself.

"That's what they both said," she agreed, "but one never knows."

"And so you get a story-book-heroine excuse to wait!"

"Little viper!"

"The cat-pig-viper won't sting unless you force it to," I guaranteed.
"There! Your dress is all right again."

"You could have finished five minutes ago, if you hadn't been determined
to lecture me. Thanks, all the same. You have your uses, though they're
not always sweet, like those of adversity."

We went our separate ways with the men who were waiting to take us in to
supper; and we didn't come together again till the dance was over, and
every one but the party specially asked to stay had gone home. We heard