looked up
and met his eyes gravely with something imperative in hers. It is a way
women have sometimes. They seem to be calling on the boy in man and
bidding him take heed.

"I wouldn't," said she, "talk to Dick about going to Wake Hill."

"What would you do? Cut stick, and let him wonder what in the deuce it's
all about?"

"I wouldn't talk; I'd write."

"Oh, write!--what's the difference?"

"If you talk, he'll say something that'll shut you up and you'll be just
as far apart as you are to-day. If you write, you can tell him as much
as you want to and no more. And the first thing he'll do will be to
bring the letter to me."

"I see," said Raven. "And you'll interpret."

"I'll interpret. I can, Rookie. I know you, don't I? and I know Dick."

"You ought to," said Raven rashly again because he was again curious,
"the man you're going to marry."

"Yes," said Nan calmly, rising, "the man I'm going to marry. Only"--her
face, as she turned it to him, brimmed over with a childish sort of
fun--"don't tell him that, Rookie. It's perfectly true I haven't
promised him. And I don't mean to--yet."

"Quite right," said Raven, rising. He felt a distinct relief. He, too,
wanted to see what Dick would make of himself. "You do your own
telling."

"There he is," said Nan, "just as it is in a play. We've got to a climax
and he comes in at the door. But, Rookie----" She stopped, for Dick was
nearing in the hall, and Raven knew what she would have said. It was in
both their minds. They hadn't finished their talk. It had merely strayed
into another channel, or bolted and run away there. Aunt Anne's money
and her Palace of Peace still stared them in the face. Dick put his head
in at the door. He looked rather sheepish, as if his dignified going had
been invalidated by this impetuous coming back, as if he couldn't live
without Nan and she was bound to see through it.

"Well?" he said gruffly. "Talked out?"

They both laughed, with the sudden absurdity of it. How should they,
their eyes questioned each other, ever be talked out, what with Aunt
Anne and the universe and France?

"Absolutely," said Nan. "Good night, Rookie. Going to write your letter?
Come on, Dick."

IV

Raven sat down at the table and began his letter. He was wrestling with
it at once, to give himself no time to argue over the point of its being
no ordinary letter such as he had been accustomed to write to Dick. He
began with the succinct statement o