it has covered everything at which I looked--both the earth
and the sky."

"And the General and the Great South Midland and Atlantic Railroad?"

"Without that word the General and the railroad would have been
nothing."

"How very much obliged to it the poor General must be!"

"Will you hear it?" I asked, for when I was once started to the goal
there was no turning me by laughter.

She raised her eyes, which had been lowered, and looked at me long and
deeply--so long and deeply that it seemed as if she were seeking
something within myself of which even I was unconscious.

"Will you hear it?" I asked again.

Her gaze was still on mine. "What is the word?" she asked, almost in a
whisper.

At the instant I felt that I staked my whole future, and yet that it was
no longer in my power to hesitate or to draw back. "The word is--you," I
replied.

Her hand dropped from the mare's neck, where it had almost touched mine,
and I watched her mouth grow tremulous until the red of it showed in a
violent contrast to the clear pallor of her face. Then she turned her
head away from me toward the sun, and thoughtful and in silence, we
passed down Franklin Street to the old grey house.

CHAPTER XIII

IN WHICH I RUN AGAINST TRADITIONS

When we had delivered the mare to the coloured groom waiting on the
sidewalk, she turned to me for the first time since I had uttered my
daring word.

"You must come in to breakfast with us," she said, with a friendly and
careless smile, "Aunt Mitty will be disappointed if I return without
what she calls 'a cavalier.'"

The doubt occurred to me if Miss Mitty would consider me entitled to so
felicitous a phrase, but smothering it the next minute as best I could,
I followed Sally, not without trepidation, up the short flight of steps,
and into the wide hall, where the air was heavy with the perfume of
fading roses. Great silver bowls of them drooped now, with blighted
heads, amid the withered smilax, and the floor was strewn thickly with
petals, as if a strong wind had blown down the staircase. From the
dining room came a delicious aroma of coffee, and as we crossed the
threshold, I saw that the two ladies, in their lace morning caps, were
already seated at the round mahogany table. From behind the tall old
silver service, the grave oval face of Miss Mitty cast on me, as I
entered, a look in which a faint wonder was mingled with a pleasant
hereditary habit of welcome. A cover was alrea