B m!"

Of course, after this there was another inevitable consequence, and then
Clem asked,

"And did you care because you imagined--you naughty, jealous girl--that
I loved Cyn?"

"Yes," Nattie answered, blushing, but honestly, "I was very unhappy,
indeed I was, Clem! I think I loved you from the first--when you were
invisible, you know!"

"And I," said Clem, "should have given myself up a victim to despair,
like Quimby, if it had not been for one thing. Jo made me a duplicate of
that picture you destroyed, and the fact that you never even mentioned
the Cupid overhead gave me hope!" and his own roguish look was in his
eyes as he saw Nattie's confusion, and laughing his merry laugh, he
clasped her in his arms.

"I beg pardon," said Cyn tapping, and entering after a cautious
interval, "But I come to inquire if Nat--I mean Nathalie--still thinks,
as she did an hour ago, that Clem and I are just suited to each other?"

Nattie laughed and blushed.

"You see I set my heart on this from the beginning," said Cyn to Clem,
not thinking it necessary to define to what "this" referred. "It was
such a perfect romance, you know! and she has been frightening me by
declaring that you were in love with me, and was so positive that she
almost made me believe it, notwithstanding my natural sagacity!"

"As I certainly should have been," replied Clem gallantly, "only for a
prior attachment. You see, I loved Nattie before ever I saw you! Why, I
used to pass the most of my time when at X n in wondering what she was
like, and wishing--I was as near her as I am now, for instance. And how
miserable I was, when she dropped me so suddenly! and how happy I was
when I came upon her at that blessed feast, and the red hair was all
explained away. And then came another cross on the circuit of my true
love."

"And had it not been for that _dear_ Betsey Kling with her invectives we
should have been mixed, and not had a cue now!" exclaimed Cyn. "I
declare, I could hug her!"

But Betsey Kling not being available just then, she substituted Nattie,
and gave her a most emphatic squeeze.

"It was your shot about the Torpedo that finished her, Cyn," laughed
Clem.

"It _was_ effective, I flatter myself," Cyn confessed. "And that reminds
me, you must not stay here now, Nat, you know; so I have seen Mrs.
Simonson, and you are going to live with me--for the present"--glancing
archly at her, "until that book is written, for instance."

"And it _will