and win. But after all, your uncle means it kindly. He acts from
interest in your soul's welfare."

Mary's face became serious.

"Yes," she said, "he has paid me the highest compliment a man can pay
to a woman--he wants to meet me in Heaven."

How could I blame Luther Warden?

I had forgotten my uniform and my glory, my hair and my hat, and was
leaning forward with my eyes on the girl. And she was leaning toward
me and our heads were very close. The rebellious brown hair was almost
in the shade of my own dashing hat-brim.

Then I said to myself in answer to the poet, "Here's the cheek that
doth not fade, too much gazed at." For its color was ever changing.
And again I said to myself and to the poet, when my glance had met
hers, and the color was mounting higher: "Here's the maid whose lip
mature is ever new; here's the eye that doth not weary." And now
aloud, forgetfully, leaning back in my chair and gazing at her from
afar off--"Here's the face one would meet in every place."

Mary's chair flew back, and it was for her to gaze at me from afar off.

"What were you saying?" she demanded in a voice not "so very soft."

"Was I saying anything?" I answered, feigning surprise. "I thought I
was only thinking. But you were speaking of Luther Warden."

"Was I?" she said, more quietly, but in an absent tone.

"You said he had paid you a great compliment, but do you know----"

I paused, being a bit nervous, and flushed, for she was looking right
at me. Not till she turned away did I finish.

"Do you know," I went on, "last night when I saw you, I thought we must
have met before, and I thought if I had met you anywhere before, it
must have been in Heaven."

I had expected that at a time like this Josiah Nummler would appear.
In that I was disappointed. In his place, with a bark and a bound,
came a lithe setter, a perfect stranger to me, and Mary seized the long
head in her hands and cried: "Why, Flash--good Flash."

She completely ignored my last remark, and patted the dog and talked to
him.

"Isn't he a beauty?" she cried. "He is Mr. Weston's."

"Whose?" I asked, concealing my irritation. "Mr. Weston--and who is
Mr. Weston?"

Mary held up a warning finger. There were footfalls on the gravel walk
around the house.

"Sh," she whispered, "here he comes--no one knows who he is."

To this day Robert Weston's age is a mystery to me; I might venture to
guess that it is between thirty and fifty. Past