in my hair, just as
your sister did one night at Newport, and I never saw her look better.
Just let me try the effect on you;" and selecting a half-opened bud,
Mark placed it among Helen's braids as if hairdressing were one of his
accomplishments. "The effect is good," he continued, turning her
blushing face to the glass and asking if it were not.

"Yes," Helen stammered, seeing more the saucy eyes looking over her head
than the lily in her hair. "Yes, good enough, but hardly in keeping with
this old dress," and vanity whispered the wish that the buff had really
been worn.

"Your dress is suitable for morning, I am sure," Mark replied, turning
a little more to the right the lily and noticing as he did so how very
white and pretty was the neck and throat seen above the collar.

Mark liked a pretty neck, and he was glad to know that Helen had one,
though why he should care was a puzzle. He could hardly have analyzed
his feelings then, or told what he did think of Helen. He only knew
that by her efforts to repel him she attracted him the more, she was so
different from any young ladies he had known; so different from Juno,
into whose hair he had never twined a water lily. It would not become
her as it did Helen, he thought, as he sat opposite her at the table,
admiring his handiwork, which even Aunt Betsy observed, remarking that
"Helen was mightily spruced up for morning," a compliment which Helen
acknowledged with a painful blush, while Mark began a disquisition upon
the nature of lilies generally, which lasted until breakfast was ended.

It was arranged that Mark should ride to the cars with Uncle Ephraim
when he went for Katy, and as this gave him a good two hours of leisure,
he spoke of Dr. Grant, asking Helen if she did not suppose he would call
around. Helen thought it possible, and then remembering how many things
were to be done that morning, she excused herself from the parlor, and
repairing to the platform out by the back door, where it was shady and
cool, she tied on a broad check apron, and rolling her sleeves above her
elbows, was just bringing the churn-dasher to bear vigorously upon the
thick cream she was turning into butter, when, having finished his
cigar, Mark went out into the yard, and following the winding path came
suddenly upon her. Helen's first impulse was to stop, but with a strong
nerving of herself she kept on while Mark, coming as near as he dared,
said to her: "Why do you do that? Is ther