coal-heavers. There's no army we've got to fight. There's just you
and me--you and I--and if we stick together, then we have all society,
we _are_ all society!"

"Ye-es, but, Milt dear, I don't want to be an outcast."

"You won't be. In the long run, if you don't take these aristocrats
seriously, they'll be all the more impressed by you."

"No. That sounds cheering, in stories and these optimistic editorials in
the magazines, but it isn't true. And you don't know how pleasant it is
to be In. I've always been more or less on the inside, and thought
outsiders dreadful. But---- Oh, I don't care! I don't care! With
you--I'm happy. That's all I know and all I want to know. I've just
grown up. I've just learned the greatest wisdom--to know when I'm
happy. But, Milt dear---- I say this because I love you. Yes, I do love
you. No, don't kiss me. Yes, it is too---- It's _far_ too public. And I
want to talk seriously. You can't have any idea how strong social
distinctions are. Don't despise them just because you don't know them."

"No. I won't. I'll learn. Probably America will get into the war. I'll
be an engineering officer. I'll learn this social dope from the
college-boy officers. And I'll come to Brooklyn with shoulder-straps and
bells on and---- Will you be waiting?"

"Oh--yes---- But, Milt! If the war comes, you must be very careful not
to get shot!"

"All right, if, you insist. Good Lord, Claire. I don't know what put it
into my head but---- Do you realize that a miracle has happened? We're
no longer Miss Boltwood and a fellow named Daggett. We have been, even
when we've liked each other, up to today. Always there's been a kind of
fence between us. We had to explain and defend ourselves and scrap----
But now we're _us_, and the rest of the world has disappeared, and----"

"And nothing else matters," said Claire.

CHAPTER XXXIV

THE BEGINNING OF A STORY

It was the farewell to Claire and Jeff Saxton, a picnic in the Cascades,
near Snoqualmie Falls--a decent and decidedly Milt-less fiesta. Mrs.
Gilson was going to show Claire that they were just as hardy adventurers
as that horrid Daggett person. So she didn't take the limousine, but
merely the seven-passenger Locomobile with the special body.

They were ever so rough and wild. They had no maid. The chauffeur was
absolutely the only help to the Gilsons, Claire, Jeff, and the
temporarily and ejaculatorily nature-loving Mrs. Betz in the daring task
of sett