uch ideas into her head," he said.

"My dear," said Ida, "you forget that such ideas do not get into
girls' heads; they are born in them."

"I presume one of the other girls sent them," said Harry, almost
angrily.

"Perhaps," replied Ida, and again she laughed her soft, sarcastic
laugh, which grated terribly on Harry. It irritated him beyond
measure that any boy should send roses to this little, delicate, fair
girl of his. For all he had spoken of her marriage, the very idea of
confiding her to any other man than himself made him furious.
Especially the idea of some rough school-boy, who knew little else
than to tumble about in a football game and was not his girl's mental
equal, irritated him. He went over in his mind all the boys in her
class. The next morning, going to New York, Edwin Shaw, who had lost
much of his uncouthness and had divorced himself entirely from his
family in the matter of English, was on the train, and he scowled at
him with such inscrutable fierceness that the boy fairly trembled. He
always bowed punctiliously to Maria's father, and this morning Maria
was with her father. She was to have a day off: sit in her father's
office and read a book until noon, then go to lunch with him at a
French restaurant, then go to the matinee. She wore a festive silk
waist, and looked altogether lovely, the boy thought.

"Who is that great gawk of a fellow?" asked Harry of Maria.

"Edwin Shaw. He was in my class," replied Maria, and she blushed, for
no earthly reason except that her father expected her to do so. Young
girls are sometimes very ready, even to deceit, to meet the emotional
expectations of their elders. Harry then and there made up his mind
that Edwin Shaw was the sender of the basket of roses.

"He comes of a family below par, and he shows it," he said,
viciously, to Maria. He scowled again at Edwin's neck, which was
awkwardly long above his collar, but the boy did not see it. He sat
on the opposite side of the car a seat in advance.

Harry said again to Maria, when they had left the train, and Edwin,
conscious of his back, which he was straightening, was striding in
front of them, what a great gawk of a fellow he was, and how he came
of a family below par. Maria assented indifferently. She did not
dream of her father's state of mind, and, as for Edwin Shaw, he was
no more to her than a set of car-steps, not so much, because the
car-steps were of obvious use.

That very night, when Maria an