ummer--"

"But I don't live there any more."

"That's so. Where do you live?"

She hesitated, and his eyes fell for the first time from her youthful
and engaging face to the clothes she wore--black clothes that seemed
cheap even to a boy who had no knowledge of feminine clothing. She was
all in rusty black, hat, gloves, jacket and skirt; and the austere and
slightly mean setting made the contrast of her hair and skin the more
fresh and vivid.

"I live," she replied diffidently, "with my two sisters in West
Fifty-fourth Street. I am stenographer and typewriter in the offices
of a department store."

"I'd like to come to see you," he said impulsively. "Shall I--when
vacation begins?"

"Are you still at school?"

He laughed: "I'm at Harvard. I'm down for Easter just now. Tell me,
Athalie, would you care to have me come to see you when I return?"

"If you would care to come."

"I surely would!" he said cordially, offering his hand in adieu--"I
want to ask you a lot of questions and we can talk over all those
jolly old times,"--as though years of comradeship lay behind them
instead of an hour or two. Then his glance fell on the slim hand he
was shaking, and he saw the strap-watch which he had given her still
clasped around her wrist.

"You wear that yet?--that old shooting-watch of mine!" he laughed.

She smiled.

"I'll give you a better one than that next Christmas," he said, taking
out a little notebook and pencil. "I'll write it down--'strap-watch
for Athalie Greensleeve next Christmas'--there it is! And--will you
give me your address?"

She gave it; he noted it, closed his little Russia-leather book with a
snap, and pocketed it.

"I'm glad I saw you," said the girl; "I hope you won't forget me. I am
late; I must go--I suppose--"

[Illustration: "'I'm glad I saw you,' said the girl; 'I hope you won't
forget me.'"]

"Indeed I won't forget you," he assured her warmly, shaking the
slender black-gloved hand again.

He meant it when he said it. Besides she was so pretty and frank and
honest with him. Few girls he knew in his own caste were as
attractive; none as simple, as direct.

He really meant to call on her some day and talk things over. But
days, and weeks, and finally months slipped away. And somehow, in
thinking of her and of his promise, there now seemed very little left
for them to talk about. After all they had said to each other nearly
all there was to be said, there on the Elevated platfo