were exceedingly gracious, but they gave Sedgwick
the impression that they were striving too hard to be agreeable.

Jack was in the seventh heaven. He tried to conceal his joy, but every
moment he would glance at Rose Jenvie with a look in his eyes which was
enough to show any miner where his bonanza was. Sedgwick was wildly
smitten, himself, but he kept his wits about him enough to watch and try
to fathom what in the bearing of the old men for some inexplainable
reason disturbed him.

When the company separated and sought their respective apartments, Jack
went to his own room, threw off his coat, put on slippers and lighted a
cigar, crossed the hall, first tapped upon the door of Sedgwick's room,
then pushed it open, walked in, closed the door, and then burst out with
"Jim, is she not a glory of the earth?"

"I think she is, indeed," was the reply. Sedgwick was thinking of Grace.

"Is there another such girl in all the world, Jim?" said Jack.

"I don't believe there is, old boy; not another one," said Sedgwick.

"What a queenly head she has! What a throat of snow! What an infinite
grace! 'Whether she sits or stands or walks or whatever thing she does,'
she is divine," said Jack.

"She impressed me just that way," said Sedgwick.

"Not too short, not too tall, with just enough flesh and blood to keep
one in mind that while she is divine, she is still a woman," said Jack.

"Only base metal enough to hold the precious metal in place," said
Sedgwick.

So Jack rattled on in the very ecstasy of his love, and so Sedgwick,
quite as deeply involved, replied; the one talking of Rose, the other
of Grace.

At length, however, Sedgwick roused himself and said: "Jack, old boy,
tell me how the old men received you."

"With open arms," said Jack. "My step-father grasped both my hands, said
he was hasty in banishing me as he did, that his heart had been filled
with remorse ever since, that he had sought in vain to find me. And old
man Jenvie, with a hearty welcome and jolly laugh, declared that I served
him exactly right when I floored him; that it had made a better man of
him ever since, and that he was glad to welcome me back to England."

Sedgwick listened, and when Jack ceased speaking there was silence for
a full minute, until Jack said:

"What are you thinking of, Jim?"

"Nothing much," said Sedgwick; "only, Jack, I have changed my mind.
I will stay and help you through the wedding; only hurry it along as
swiftly