e which makes me so happy.
Gladys, I shall be so shy of him to-morrow when he comes here that
he will probably think I'm in the sulks. And he's coming early
probably, before any of the others--before lunch, in fact."

Gladys got up.

"Oh, Daisy, I don't think you ought to have arranged that," she said.
"Do you mean he will find just you and me here?"

Daisy laughed.

"He needn't find you unless you like," she said. "And I didn't exactly
arrange it. I told him you and I would be alone here, and he asked if he
might get down early. I couldn't exactly forbid him; besides, darling, I
didn't want to."

"Mother wouldn't like it," said Gladys.

"So please don't tell her," remarked Daisy. "I hate vexing people.
She won't find out either. We shall go on the river or something,
and come back after the rest of the people have arrived. You are so
old-fashioned, Gladys; besides, it isn't certain that he will come.
He only said he would if he could. But he is the sort of man who
usually can when he wishes."

"I ought to tell mother," said Gladys.

"I know, but you won't."

Daisy laughed again, and then suddenly, without reason, her spirits
fell.

"Oh dear, what a little beast I have been!" she said. "I did arrange
that he should come, Gladys; at least, I made it imperative that he
should ask if he might, and now it seems so calculating and
cold-blooded. Girls like whom I used to be till--till about
forty-eight hours ago are such brutes. They plot and scheme and
entrap men. Pigs! I almost hope he won't come. I do, really. And yet
that wouldn't do either, for it would look as if he had found me out
and was disgusted with me. I believe you are all wrong, both you and
Aunt Alice, and that he doesn't care for me in the least. He has
flirted with half London. It isn't his fault; women have always
encouraged him, just as I have done. What beasts we are!"

"Oh, well, come and pick boughs of laburnum," said Gladys. "Let's go and
do something. We've been indoors all the afternoon."

"But I don't want to pick boughs of laburnum," said Daisy. "Why should
we do the gardener's work? I want to cry."

"Very well, cry," said Gladys. "Oh, Daisy, I'm not a brute. I am so
sorry you feel upset. But you know you are very happy; you have told me
so. I should like to be immensely sympathetic, but you do change so
quickly, I can't quite keep up. It must be very puzzling. Do you suppose
everybody is like you when she falls in love?"

"And