leen--I don't
know why. But I had not; there was Suddy Gray--a nice boy, perfectly
qualified; and there were alternates more worldly, perhaps. But I did
not think of you; and that is what now amazes and humiliates me; because
it was the obvious that I overlooked--the most perfectly natural--"

"Nina! you are madder than a March heiress!"

"Air your theories, Phil, then come back to realities. The conditions
remain; Eileen is certainly a little in love with you; and a little with
her means something. And you, evidently, have never harboured any
serious intentions toward the child; I can see that, because you are the
most transparent man I ever knew. Now, the question is, what is to be
done?"

"Done? Good heavens! Nothing, of course! There's nothing to do anything
about! Nina, you are the most credulous little matchmaker that ever--"

"Oh, Phil, _must_ I listen to all those fulminations before you come
down to the plain fact? And it's plain to me as the nose on your
countenance; and I don't know what to do about it! I certainly was a
perfect fool to confide in you, for you are exhibiting the coolness and
sagacity of a stampeded chicken."

He laughed in spite of himself; then, realising a little what her
confidence had meant, he turned a richer red and slowly lifted his
fingers to his moustache, while his perplexed gray eyes began to narrow
as though sun-dazzled.

"I am, of course, obliged to believe that you are mistaken," he said; "a
man cannot choose but believe in that manner. . . . There is no very
young girl--nobody, old or young, whom I like as thoroughly as I do
Eileen Erroll. She knows it; so do you, Nina. It is open and
above-board. . . . I should be very unhappy if anything marred or
distorted our friendship. . . . I am quite confident that nothing will."

"In that frame of mind," said his sister, smiling, "you are the
healthiest companion in the world for her, for you will either cure her,
or she you; and it is all right either way."

"Certainly it will be all right," he said confidently.

For a few moments he paced the room, reflective, quickening his pace all
the while; and his sister watched him, silent in her indecision.

"I'm going up to see the kids," he said abruptly.

The children, one and all, were in the Park; but Eileen was sewing in
the nursery, and his sister did not call him back as he swung out of the
room and up the stairs. But when he had disappeared, Nina dropped into
her chair, a