escape was fatefully
propitious. The President was entertaining the newly arrived French
delegate and the ministers Mason and Slidell, just appointed to the
courts of St. James and the Tuileries. Everybody that was anybody was of
the splendid company.

Jack, however, was tortured by a doubt of Dick's constancy when it came
to an abrupt quitting of his sweetheart. Poor lad, he fought the battle
bravely, making no sign; and when Rosa, the picture of demure
loveliness, in her girlish finery, asked him maliciously as the carriage
drove toward the Executive Mansion--

"Don't you feel like a traitor, you sly Yankee?" Dick gave a great groan
and said:

"O Rosa, Rosa, I can't go! I do feel like a traitor. I am a traitor."

Jack, luckily, was sitting beside him, and brought his heel down on the
lad's toes with such emphasis that he uttered a cry of pain. Rosa was
all solicitude at this.

"What is it, Richard; have I wounded you? Don't mind my chatter; I only
do it to tease you. He shall be a Yankee; he shall make nutmegs; he
shall abuse the chivalrous South; he shall be what he likes; he sha'n't
be teased--" and she wound her bare arms about his neck, quite
indifferent to the reproving nudges of mamma and the sad mirthfulness
of Jack.

Dick found means in the noise of the chariot, and the crush they
presently came into, for saying something that seemed to lessen the
self-reproachful tone of the penitent, and, when they entered the modest
portals of the presidency, Rosa was radiant and Dick equable, but not in
his usual chattering volubility.

"You are sure you do not repent? You can stay if you choose," Jack said,
as they entered the dressing-room.

"Where you go, I go; what you say is right I know is right, and I will
do it." Dick looked away confusedly as he said this. They were
surrounded by young officers, all of whom the two young men knew.

"Ah, ha, Mr. Perley! I have stolen a march on you; I have secured the
first waltz from Miss Rosa," a young man at the mirror cried, as Dick
adjusted his gloves.

"Then, Captain Warrick, I'm likely to be a wall-flower, for the second,
third, and fourth were promised yesterday."

"Fortunes of war, my dear fellow--fortunes of war. You must lay siege to
another fortress."

"Dick," Jack whispered, "it's an omen. It will give us time to slip out
and change our garments without the danger of excuses, for, though
nothing is suspected, any incautious phrase may destroy us."

"