n it, without giving himself time to put down the book he was reading
or to take off the overcoat he had put on for want of a fire, and
finding himself in some embarrassment because of the misapprehension
which this fact involved.

"Ready, Peter?"

"Come along, Peter!"

"I ... I'm not going," said Peter.

"What? Not going to the rink with us to-night? Why, you said----" The
bright group of his fellow boarders hung upon the narrow landing like
bees at the threshold of a hive.

"I said I'd go if I could--" protested Peter, "and I can't."

"Gee! What's the matter with you?"

"Don't be a beastly stiff!"

"Come on, fellows, we'll miss the car. Let him be a stiff if he wants
to."

Peter heard their feet retreating on the stairs, and then he saw that
Minnie Havens still hesitated at the landing. She had on her best silk
waist and her blond pompadour was brushed higher than ever. Her eyes,
which were blue, were fixed directly on him with something in the
meeting that gave him the impression, gaspingly, of being about to step
off into space. He seemed suddenly to see a path opening directly
through the skating rink and the Saturday Social Club to the House of
the Shining Walls, and Minnie Havens walking in it beside him. He
wrenched his mind away forcibly from that and fixed it on the figure of
his weekly salary.

"Couldn't you?" she persuaded.

"No," said Peter. "I'm much obliged to you, but I really couldn't."

But before he had time to take up his reading, which somehow he was not
able to do immediately, he heard Mrs. Blodgett, who made a point of
being as kind to her boarders as she could afford to be, tapping at his
door.

"I thought you'd be going to the rink to-night."

"No," said Peter.

"You don't think it's wrong, or anything?"

"Oh, no, not in the least."

"Well, Mr. Weatheral, I've seen a power of young folks, comin' and
goin', in my business and it don't pay for 'em to get too stodgy like.
They need livenin' up." She hung upon the door as Peter waited for her
to go. "Miss Havens is a nice girl," she ventured.

Peter admitted it. "I've my mother and sister to think of," he told her,
and presently he found he had told her a great deal more.

"Well," commented Mrs. Blodgett, "you do have a lot to carry.... Was you
readin' now, Mr. Weatheral? ... because it's warmer down in my sittin'
room, and there's only Aggie and me sewin'.... Besides," she argued
triumphantly, "it's savin' light."

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