o the lowest. Little
Sibyl asked what a lover meant, and Marion Jones, a lanky girl of
twelve, blushed while she answered her.

"It isn't proper to speak about lovers," said Katie Philips. "Mother
said we weren't to know anything about them. I asked her once, and that
was what she said. She said it wasn't proper for little girls to know
about lovers."

"But grown girls have them," responded Marion, "I think it must be
captivating. I wish I was grown up."

"You're much too ugly, Marion, to have a lover," responded Mary Mills.
"Oh, for goodness' sake, don't get so red and angry! She's going to
strike me! Save me, girls!"

"Hush!" exclaimed Katie, "hush! come this way. Look through the lattice.
Look through the wire fence just here. Can you see? There's Fluff, and
there's her lover. He's rather old, isn't he? But hasn't he _l'air
distingue_? Isn't Fluff pretty when she blushes? The lover is rather
tall. Oh, do look, Mary, can you see--can you see?"

"Yes, he has fair hair," responded Mary. "It curls. I'm sorry it is fair
and curly, for Fluff's is the same. He should be dark, like a Spaniard.
Oh, girls, girls, he has got such lovely blue eyes, and such white
teeth! He smiled just now, and I saw them."

"Let me peep," said Marion. "I haven't got one peep yet."

But here the voices became a little loud, and the lovers, if they were
lovers, passed out of sight behind the yew hedge.

"That's it," said Fluff when she had finished her story; "it's all
explained now. I hope you're obliged to me."

"No brother could love you better, nor appreciate you more than I do,
Fluff."

"Thank you; I'll tell you how much I care for those words when you let
me know what you are going to do."

Arnold put his hand to his forehead; his face grew grave, he looked
with an earnest, half-puzzled glance at the childish creature by his
side.

"I really think you are the best girl in the world, and one of the
cleverest," he said. "I have a feeling that you have an idea in your
head, but I am sorry to say nothing very hopeful up to the present time
has occurred to me. It does seem possible, after your explanation, that
Frances may love me, and yet refuse me; yes, certainly, that does now
seem possible."

"How foolish you are to speak in that doubting tone," half snapped Fluff
(certainly, if the girls had seen her now they would have thought she
was quarreling with her lover). "How can you say perhaps Frances loves
you? Loves you! She is