talked about him all the time I should be afraid she
wasn't quite as deeply in love as I want her to be. She's only a woman,
you know, Henry. If she were a man, it would be different."

The indications were verified by the results. August came, and Mrs.
Upton invited Miss Meeker to spend the month at the Uptons' summer
cottage at Skirton, and Bliss was asked up for "a day or two" while she
was there.

"Isn't it a little dangerous, my dear?" Upton asked, when his wife asked
him to extend the hospitality of the cottage to Bliss. "I should think
twice before asking Walter to come."

"How absurd you are!" retorted the match-maker. "What earthly objection
can there be?"

"No objection at all," returned Upton, "but it may destroy all your good
work. It will be a terrible test for Walter, I am afraid--breakfast, for
instance, is a fearful ordeal for most men. They are so apt to be at
their very worst at breakfast, and it might happen that Walter could not
stand the strain upon him through a series of them. Then Molly may not
look well in the mornings. How is that? Is she like you--always at her
best?"

Mrs. Upton replied with a smile. It was evident that she did not
consider the danger very great.

"They might as well get used to seeing each other at breakfast," she
said. "If they find they don't admire each other at that time, it is
just as well they should know it in advance."

Hence it was, as I have said, that Bliss was invited to Skirton for a
day or two. And the day or two, in the most natural way in the world,
lengthened out into a week or two. There were walks and talks; there
were drives and long horseback rides along shaded mountain roads, and
when it rained there were mornings in the music-room together. Bliss was
good-natured at breakfast, and Molly developed a capacity for appearing
to advantage at that trying meal that aroused Upton's highest regard;
and finally--well, finally Miss Molly Meeker whispered something into
Mrs. Upton's ear, at which the latter was so overjoyed that she nearly
hugged her young friend to death.

"Here, my dear, look out," remonstrated Upton, who happened to be
present. "Don't take it all. Perhaps she wants to live long enough to
whisper something to me."

"I do," said Molly, and then she announced her engagement to Walter
Bliss; and she did it so sweetly that Upton had all he could do to keep
from manifesting his approval after the fashion adopted by his wife.

"I wish I