down at his table sometimes."

"She's going to be stopped doing _that_," Nancy said.

"Well, you remember the night when you went home early with a
headache, and passed by his table going out?"

"Yes, but I didn't know he saw me."

"He sees everything, Betty says."

"He didn't suspect me?"

"He didn't know you came out of the interior. He said to Betty, 'It's
curious that Miss Martin never stays here to dine in the evening,
though she so often drops in.' Betty is pretty quick, you know. She
said, 'I think Miss Martin is a friend of the proprietor.'"

"So I am," said Nancy, "the best friend she's got. Go on, dear."

"Then he said slowly and thoughtfully, 'It's a crime for a woman like
that not to be the mother of children. If ever I saw a maternal type,
Miss Ann Martin is the apotheosis of it. Why some man hasn't made her
understand that long ago I can not see.'"

Nancy's cheeks burned crimson and then white again.

"How dare Betty?" she said.

"Wait till you hear. You know Betty doesn't care what she says. Her
reply to that was peculiarly Bettyish. She sighed and cast down her
eyes,--the little imp! 'The course of true love never does run
smooth,' she said; 'perhaps Ann has discovered the truth of that old
saying in some new connection.' She didn't mean to be a cat, she was
only trying to create a romantic interest in your affairs, doing as
she would be done by. The effect was more than she bargained for
though. Collier Pratt's eyes quite lit up. 'I can imagine no greater
crime than frustrating the instincts of a woman like that,' he said.
Imagine that--the instincts--whereupon Betty, of course, flounced off
and left him."

"She would," Nancy said. Then a storm of real anger surged through
her. "I'll turn her out of my place to-morrow. I'll never look at her
or speak to her again."

"I think it would be more to the point," Caroline said, "to turn out
Collier Pratt. That was certainly an extraordinary way for him to
speak of you to a girl who is a stranger to him."

"Caroline, you're almost as bad as Betty is. You're both of you
hopelessly--helplessly--provincially American. I don't think that was
extraordinary or impertinent even," Nancy said. "I--I understand how
that man means things."

* * * * *

The car drove up in front of the office of the justice of the peace in
the town beyond that in which they had had their unauspicious luncheon
party.

"Are we