war. He's very brave; and he isn't a bit
like a foreigner and hasn't any nasty supercilious notions about women.
Mr. Grier says he has a _future_. And really, Miss Wing, he is just
like a--a--a kind of knight."

"Where did you meet him?"

"At Helen's last summer. And he was going out to Minneapolis to see
papa, I--I think. But he got a cable of his uncle's death. And his two
little cousins died last year; so now he is the head of the family; and
he must go to Germany at once. For his father is dead, you know. So he
wrote (in Helen's letter, because he is so--so awfully proper!) asking
to let him come here and take me to drive--in the American fashion. I
know who put him up to that scheme; it was Helen. I had to ask Miss
Parker, because you were out; and she said if he wasn't a relation or
the man I was going to marry I couldn't go. 'Of course, if he were the
man you expect to marry,' she said, and--and I--I said, 'But he is!'
Just like that. I can't fancy how I came to say such a thing, but when
it was said I didn't know how to explain; and I was so awfully ashamed;
and, besides"--she lifted her eyes in the frank and direct gaze that
Miss Wing always liked--"besides, I do want to see him."

"And do you expect him to ask you to marry him?" said Miss Wing, with a
deepening of the color on her cheek, which went out suddenly like the
flame of a lamp in the wind.

Florence Raimund blushed again, but this time she laughed: "I don't
know. He is so awfully proper," said she, "and he hasn't had a chance to
ask papa; but--I think he wants to."

"In that case, isn't he the man whom you expect to marry?" asked Miss
Wing dryly. "But it was deceiving her just the same. I am glad you came,
Florence."

Here the girl looked up; and something in Miss Wing's eyes made her dash
across the room to fling herself on her knees before that lady with an
inarticulate gasp between a sob and a laugh, and the sentences came in a
rush: "I _had_ to come! I couldn't deceive you if I never saw him again.
And besides, I hoped you would think of some way!"

"And you escape quite unpunished?" said Miss Wing gently.

At which the black head sank lower, while a smothered voice mumbled: "Do
you think I--_liked_ it, coming to tell?"

Miss Wing smoothed her hair. "It would have pained me very much if you
had not come. Tell me; whether he sees you or not, will he not write to
your father? Do you think his feeling is so slight that a disappointment
wi