pleaded for a verdict of "Well
done!" with such an appealing smile and such a fine show of dimples that
every one was fascinated and applauded heartily.

Miss Damer skated as became her free and vigorous character. She had
passed her Little Go as a scholar, and was now steadily winning her way
through the list of achievements, before given, toward the Great Go.
To-day she was at work at small circles backward. Presently she wound
off a series of perfectly neat ones, and, looking up, pleased with her
prowess, caught Wade's admiring eye. At this she smiled and gave an
arch little womanly nod of self-approval, which also demanded masculine
sympathy before it was quite a perfect emotion.

With this charming gesture, the alert feather in her Amazonian hat
nodded, too, as if it admired its lovely mistress.

Wade was thrilled. "Brava!" he cried, in answer to the part of her look
which asked sympathy; and then, in reply to the implied challenge, he
forgot his hurt and his shock, and struck into the same figure.

He tried not to surpass his fair exemplar too cruelly. But he did his
peripheries well enough to get a repetition of the captivating nod and a
Bravo! from the lady.

"Bravo!" said she. "But do not tax your strength too soon."

She began to feel that she was expressing too much interest in the
stranger. It was a new sensation for her to care whether men fell or got
up. A new sensation. She rather liked it. She was a trifle ashamed of
it. In either case, she did not wish to show that it was in her heart.
The consciousness of concealment flushed her damask check.

It was a damask cheek. All her hues were cool and pearly; while Wade,
Saxon too, had hot golden tints in his hair and moustache, and his
color, now returning, was good strong red with plenty of bronze in it.

"Thank you," he replied. "My force has all come back. You have
electrified me."

A civil nothing; but meaning managed to get into his tone and look,
whether he would or not.

Which he perceiving, on his part began to feel guilty.

Of what crime?

Of the very same crime as hers,--the most ancient and most pardonable
crime of youth and maiden,--that sweet and guiltless crime of love in
the first degree.

So, without troubling themselves to analyze their feelings, they found
a piquant pleasure in skating together,--she in admiring his _tours de
force_, and he in instructing her.

"Look, Peter!" said Mrs. Skerrett, pointing to the other pair ska