down between their
blankets and count their mercies," said Anne to Jane Andrews, who had
come up to spend the afternoon and stay all night. But when they were
cuddled between their blankets, in Anne's little porch room, it was not
her mercies of which Jane was thinking.

"Anne," she said very solemnly, "I want to tell you something. May I"

Anne was feeling rather sleepy after the party Ruby Gillis had given the
night before. She would much rather have gone to sleep than listen
to Jane's confidences, which she was sure would bore her. She had no
prophetic inkling of what was coming. Probably Jane was engaged,
too; rumor averred that Ruby Gillis was engaged to the Spencervale
schoolteacher, about whom all the girls were said to be quite wild.

"I'll soon be the only fancy-free maiden of our old quartet," thought
Anne, drowsily. Aloud she said, "Of course."

"Anne," said Jane, still more solemnly, "what do you think of my brother
Billy?"

Anne gasped over this unexpected question, and floundered helplessly
in her thoughts. Goodness, what DID she think of Billy Andrews? She
had never thought ANYTHING about him--round-faced, stupid, perpetually
smiling, good-natured Billy Andrews. Did ANYBODY ever think about Billy
Andrews?

"I--I don't understand, Jane," she stammered. "What do you
mean--exactly?"

"Do you like Billy?" asked Jane bluntly.

"Why--why--yes, I like him, of course," gasped Anne, wondering if she
were telling the literal truth. Certainly she did not DISlike Billy.
But could the indifferent tolerance with which she regarded him, when he
happened to be in her range of vision, be considered positive enough for
liking? WHAT was Jane trying to elucidate?

"Would you like him for a husband?" asked Jane calmly.

"A husband!" Anne had been sitting up in bed, the better to wrestle with
the problem of her exact opinion of Billy Andrews. Now she fell flatly
back on her pillows, the very breath gone out of her. "Whose husband?"

"Yours, of course," answered Jane. "Billy wants to marry you. He's
always been crazy about you--and now father has given him the upper farm
in his own name and there's nothing to prevent him from getting married.
But he's so shy he couldn't ask you himself if you'd have him, so he got
me to do it. I'd rather not have, but he gave me no peace till I said I
would, if I got a good chance. What do you think about it, Anne?"

Was it a dream? Was it one of those nightmare things in which yo