"We'll go back if you say so; but it seems foolish after traveling all
this distance."

"I meant to go back alone," she hastened to correct him.

"And leave me with Mrs. Halliday?"

"Please don't mix things all up!"

"It's you who are mixing things all up," he said earnestly. "That
isn't like you, little girl. It's more like you to straighten things
out. There's a straight road ahead of us now, and if you'll only take
it we'll never leave it again. All we've got to do is to hunt up a
parson and get married, and then we'll go anywhere you say, or not go
anywhere at all. It's as simple as that. Then, when our vacation is
up, I'll go back to Carter, Rand & Seagraves, and I'll tell Farnsworth
he'll have to get a new stenographer. Maybe he'll discharge me for
that, but if he doesn't I'll tell him I want to get out and sell. And
then there's nothing more to it. With you to help--"

He tried to find her hands, but she had them pressed over her eyes.

"With you back home to help," he repeated--"there's not anything in
the world we won't get."

And the dream woman in Sally answered to the woman on the steps:--

"There's not anything more in the world we'll want when we're home."

But Don did not hear that. All he heard was a sigh. To the dream woman
what he said sounded like music; but the woman on the steps answered
cynically:--

"All he is saying to you now he said to that other. There, where the
music was playing and the Japanese lanterns were bobbing, he said it
to her. That was a fairy world, as this is a fairy night; but back in
New York it will all be different. There are no fairies in New York.
Every time you have thought there were, you have been disappointed."

She rose swiftly to her feet.

"Oh, we mustn't talk about it!" she exclaimed.

He too rose, and he placed both his hands upon her shoulders.

"I don't understand," he said quickly. "What is it you don't
believe?"

"I don't believe in fairies," she answered bitterly.

"Don't you believe that I love you?"

"To-night--perhaps," she answered.

Her eyes were not meeting his.

"You don't believe my love will last?"

"I--I don't know."

"Because of Frances?"

"Everything is so different in New York," she answered.

"Because of Frances?"

She was not sure enough herself to answer that. She did not wish to be
unfair. He removed his hands from her shoulders and stood back a
little.

"I thought you'd understand about her. I thought you were