more logical and
questioning, had taken its old place again. She put both her hands on my
arm now and looked me fairly in the face, where the color still
proclaimed some sort of guilt on my part, although my heart was clean
and innocent as hers.

"Nicholas," she said, "come to-night. Bring me my little jewel--and
bring--"

"The minister! If I do that, Elisabeth, you will marry me then?"

"Yes!" she whispered softly.

Amid all the din and babble of that motley throng I heard the word, low
as it was. I have never heard a voice like Elisabeth's.

An instant later, I knew not quite how, her hand was away from my arm,
in that of Aunt Betty, and they were passing toward the main door,
leaving me standing with joy and doubt mingled in my mind.

CHAPTER VIII

MR. CALHOUN ACCEPTS

A woman's tongue is her sword, that she never lets rust.
--_Madam Necker_.

I struggled among three courses. The impulses of my heart, joined to
some prescience of trouble, bade me to follow Elisabeth. My duty ordered
me to hasten to Mr. Calhoun. My interest demanded that I should tarry,
for I was sure that the Baroness von Ritz would make no merely idle
request in these circumstances. Hesitating thus, I lost sight of her in
the throng. So I concluded I would obey the mandate of duty, and turned
toward the great doors. Indeed, I was well toward the steps which led
out into the grounds, when all at once two elements of my problem
resolved themselves into one. I saw the tall figure of Mr. Calhoun
himself coming up the walk toward me.

"Ah," said he briefly, "then my message found you?"

"I was starting for you this moment, sir" I replied.

"Wait for a moment. I counted on finding you here. Matters have
changed."

I turned with him and we entered again the East Room, where Mr. Tyler
still prolonged the official greeting of the curious, the obsequious, or
the banal persons who passed. Mr. Calhoun stood apart for a time,
watching the progress of this purely American function. It was some time
ere the groups thinned. This latter fact usually would have ended the
reception, since it is not etiquette to suppose that the president can
lack an audience; but to-day Mr. Tyler lingered. As last through the
thinning throng he caught sight of the distinctive figure of Mr.
Calhoun. For the first time his own face assumed a natural expression.
He stopped the line for an instant, and with a raised ha