"Was it? How were you sure it was I?"

"In Carlow County!"

"He might have written it himself."

"Fisbee has never in his life read anything lighter than cuneiform
inscriptions."

"Miss Briscoe----"

"She doesn't read Lewis Carroll; and it was not her hand. What made you
write it on Fisbee's manuscript?"

"He was with us this afternoon, and I teased him a little about your
heading. 'Business and the Cradle, the Altar, and the Tomb,' isn't it?
And he said it had always troubled him, but that you thought it good.
So do I. He asked me if I could think of anything that you might like
better, to put in place of it, and I wrote, 'The time has come,' because
it was the only thing I could think of that was as appropriate and as
fetching as your headlines. He was perfectly dear about it. He was so
serious; he said he feared it wouldn't be acceptable. I didn't notice
that the paper he handed me to write on was part of his notes, nor
did he, I think. Afterward, he put it back in his pocket. It wasn't a
message."

"I'm not so sure he did not notice. He is very wise. Do you know,
somehow, I have the impression that the old fellow wanted me to meet
you."

"How dear and good of him!" She spoke earnestly, and her face was
suffused with a warm light. There was no doubt about her meaning what
she said.

"It was," John answered, unsteadily. "He knew how great was my need of a
few moments' companionableness with--with----"

"No," she interrupted. "I meant dear and good to me, because I think he
was thinking of me, and it was for my sake he wanted us to meet."

It would have been hard to convince a woman, if she had overheard this
speech, that Miss Sherwood's humility was not the calculated affectation
of a coquette. Sometimes a man's unsuspicion is wiser, and Harkless knew
that she was not flirting with him. In addition, he was not a fatuous
man; he did not extend the implication of her words nearly so far as she
would have had him.

"But I had met you," said he, "long ago."

"What!" she cried, and her eyes danced. "You actually remember?"

"Yes; do you?" he answered. "I stood in Jones's field and heard you
singing, and I remembered. It was a long time since I had heard you
sing:

"'I was a ruffler of Flanders,
And fought for a florin's hire.
You were the dame of my captain
And sang to my heart's desire.'

"But that is the balladist's notion. The truth is that you were