erself should get whatever ye want without more charms
than yer own bright eyes."

Sylvia laughed and dropped a little curtsy toward the kind Irish face.

"No,--no, it will take this," she sighed; "but with this, how I shall
try, how I shall try!" The fervent tone suddenly became prosaic. "Have
you any clean empty bottles, Jenny?"

The listeners at the window were dumb. Edna's expression had changed
from glee to bewilderment. John took her arm and drew her away quietly.
Together they moved noiselessly across the grass, but by tacit
agreement not back to the piazza. For a minute of silence they strayed
down the wood road, beneath the moon.

Dunham was first to break the embarrassed silence. "By Jove, for a
minute there I felt _de trop_. The fair Sylvia was having fun with the
cook, wasn't she? I wonder what she's really up to?"

"We say all sorts of things to Jenny, you know," returned Edna. "She's
the best soul that ever lived."

At the same time both speakers knew that what they had seen in Sylvia's
face and heard in her voice exceeded pleasantry.

An idea overwhelmed Edna. An idea which so fitted into the
circumstances that betwixt its appeal and the incredibility of Sylvia's
words being serious, she felt like flying from John and being alone to
think over the recent scene. If only Dunham were not penetrated by the
same thought that had come to her! For another minute neither spoke,
and then it was John who again broke the silence.

"Say, Edna," he suddenly ejaculated, "what's the use? That girl was in
earnest."

"Nonsense. She isn't a pagan," flashed the other.

"Well, I don't know. She had a father who was one. According to Judge
Trent he was all for that sort of thing, and pinned his faith to
everything supernatural, from a rabbit's foot to a clairvoyant."

Edna's face clouded with fastidious distaste even while she breathed a
shade more freely. Evidently from John's tone her own diagnosis had not
occurred to the hero of it. "She had a matrimonial scheme on foot when
I first met her," he went on. "She was considering some actor because
she wished to go on the stage."

"Rather strange that such a fact should have transpired in a first
interview," remarked Edna dryly.

"No, because that was a session devoted merely to ways and means. But
she's not saying hocus-pocus and stirring caldrons on _his_ account,
you may be certain. She admitted that he was an old image."

"It's too absurd for us to discuss