ife Bridge, then, an' cast a look into Annie
Darling's gardin. She's gone away an' left it as neat as wax, an' that
gate o' hern swings open sometimes an' them 'tarnal ducks'll git in. You
wait a minute. I'll give ye a mite o' wire I kep' to twist round the
gate." He sought absorbedly in his pocket and pulled out a little coil.
"There!" said he, "that's the talk."

Wilfred accepted the wire in silence, and drove along.

"Who's Annie Darling?" asked Lily with innocence.

She had not been long in the town without hearing that Wilfred had been
"going" with Annie Darling before his sudden invitation to her, that
night after prayer-meeting, "May I have the pleasure of seeing you
home?" Wilfred himself could not have told why he asked that question
when Annie, he knew, was only a pace behind. The one thing he could
remember was that, when he saw Lily coming, he realized that he had
never in his life known there were cheeks so red and eyes so dark.

"Who is she?" asked Lily, again, tightening her veil. It had been
blowing against his cheek.

"Annie Darling?" said Wilfred, with difficulty. "Why, she's a girl lives
round here. Her mother died last winter, and she's been tryin' to go out
nursin'. That's where she's gone now, I guess."

Lily Marshall laughed.

"It's a funny name," she said. "I should think folks'd turn it round and
make it 'Darling Annie.'"

Wilfred felt a hot wave sweeping over him, the tide of recollection.

"Well," said he, "I guess they have--some of 'em."

Lily gave him a swift glance, and wondered how much she really liked
him. He seemed "pretty country" sometimes beside the young hardware man
who was writing her from the West. But she was one to "make things go,"
and she talked glibly on until they had crossed Alewife Bridge and
Wilfred drew up before a gray house with a garden in front, marked out
in little prim beds defined by pebbles, and all without a weed. The
iris, purple and yellow, seemed to be holding banners, it was so gay,
and the lilacs were in bloom. He left the reins in Lily's hands, and
stood a moment at the gate, glancing at the beds. Then he went inside,
tried the front door, and shut a blind that had failed to catch, and
after a second frowning look at all the beds, came out and wired the
gate.

"Well," said Lily, as they drove away, "ain't you good, takin' all that
trouble!"

Wilfred frowned again.

"I don't like to see things go to wrack and ruin," he remarked.

"How's