They both laughed. She raised her eyes. How exquisitely fair and sweet
and dainty she was! The soft hair had shining lights; and her eyes had a
twilight look that suggested a pellucid lake, with evening shades
blowing over it.

"A little more of something would have made him a hero, and spoiled the
book."

"But I don't like Amelia, nor Becky; and the Crawleys are horrid. And
Thackeray seems holding up everybody and laughing at them. I like to
believe in people."

"I am glad there is a time when we can believe in them: it is the
radiant time of youth. What did that little smile hide, and half betray?
Confess!"

"Are you so very old?"

The charming gravity was irresistible.

"Seven and twenty, and I am beginning to worship Thackeray. At seven and
thirty, he will be one of my passions, I know. Now and then I come to a
sentence that goes to my heart. No, do not read him yet awhile, unless
it is some of the little things. There is 'Dr. Birch and his Young
Friends;' and if you want to be amused you must read his continuation of
'Ivanhoe.' But then you will have neither heroines nor heroes left. And
if you and Miss Daisy want to laugh beyond measure, get the 'Rose and
the Ring,' that he wrote for his two little girls."

"Oh," said Hanny, "are they at home, in England?"

"Yes, with an aunt."

"Haven't they any mother?"

"They have no mother," he said gravely.

Years later, the novelist was to be one of the little girl's heroes,
when she knew all the bravery of his life, and why his little girls were
without a mother.

Joe and Daisy returned, and there was a pleasant rencontre; then Delia
and Ben came up, and they had a merry chat and a promenade.

"I wonder," as the musicians began tuning again, "if you are engaged for
all the dances. Could I be allowed one?"

He took up her card.

"I have been dancing so much already; but Mrs. Jasper said I might try
the Spanish dance."

"Oh, then try it with me! I am not too old to dance, if I have come to
adoring Thackeray. And I am to go away soon."

"To go away--where?" And she glanced up with an interest that gave him a
quick sense of pleasure.

"To Hamburg first; then to find some relations."

"In Germany? But you are not a German?" in surprise.

"I ought to be a Dane, if one's birth counts for anything; and if one's
ancestors count, then an old Dutch Knickerbocker," he returned, with a
soft, amused laugh. "But I believe I cannot boast of any English
descen