there was not a flat in the Big Barracks in which a
girl could carry on a courtship. Fancy her attempting it in her front
room, with the room choked with people, with the baby squalling, and her
little brothers and sisters quarrelling, with her mother entertaining
half a dozen women visitors with tea or beer, and with a man or two
dropping in to smoke with her father! Parlor courtship was to her, like
precise English, a thing only known in novels. The thought of novels
floated her soul back into the dream state.

"I think Cordelia's a pretty name," said Fletcher, cold at heart but
struggling to be companionable.

"I don't," said Cordelia. "I'm not at all crushed on it. Your name's
terrible pretty. I think my three names looks like a map of Ireland when
they're written down. I know a killin' name for a girl. It's Clarice.
Maybe some day I'll give you a dare. I'll double dare you, maybe, to
call me Clarice."

Oh, if he only would, she thought--if he would only call her so now! But
she forgot how unelastic his strange routine of life must have left him,
and she did not dream how her behavior in the park had displeased him.

"Cordelia is a pretty name," he repeated. "At any rate, I think we
should try to make the most and best of whatever name has come to us. I
wouldn't sail under false colors for a minute."

"Oh!" said she, with a giggle to hide her disappointment; "you're so
terrible wise! When you talk them big words you can pass me in a walk."

Anxious to display her great conquest to the other girls of the Barracks
neighborhood, Cordelia persuaded Mr. Fletcher to go to what she called
"the dock," to enjoy the cool breath of the river. All the piers and
wharves are called "docks" by the people. Those which are semi-public
and are rented to miscellaneous excursion and river steamers are crowded
nightly.

The wharf to which our couple strolled was a mere flooring above the
water, edged with a stout string-piece, which formed a bench for the
mothers. They were there in groups, some seated on the string-piece with
babes in arms or with perambulators before them, and others, facing
these, standing and joining in the gossip, and swaying to and fro to
soothe their little ones. Those who gave their offspring the breast did
so publicly, unembarrassed by a modesty they would have considered
false. A few youthful couples, boy by girl and girl by boy, sat on the
string-piece and whispered, or bandied fun with those other lo