hat I was present at!

"We must all be happy. Nobody can break our hearts if we are strong
enough to withhold them. Nobody can hurt us too much if we can find
the way to be our bravest all the time. I know that what you are
feeling now is not real. I can't tell you how I know, but I do know
the difference. The roots are not deep enough. They could be pulled up
without too terrible a havoc.

"Uncle Jimmie, dear, believe me, believe me. I said this would be a
hard letter to write, and it has been. If you could see my poor
inkstained, weeping face, you would realize that I am only your funny
little Eleanor after all, and not to be taken seriously at all. I hope
you will come up for my graduation. When you see me with all the other
lumps and frumps that are here, you will know that I am not worth
considering except as a kind of human joke.

"Good-by, dear, my dear, and God bless you.

"Eleanor."

* * * * *

It was less than a week after this letter to Jimmie that Margaret
spending a week-end in a town in Connecticut adjoining that in which
Eleanor's school was located, telephoned Eleanor to join her
overnight at the inn where she was staying. She had really planned the
entire expedition for the purpose of seeing Eleanor and preparing her
for the revelations that were in store for her, though she was
ostensibly meeting a motoring party, with which she was going on into
the Berkshires.

She started in abruptly, as was her way, over the salad and cheese in
the low studded Arts and Crafts dining-room of the fashionable road
house, contrived to look as self-conscious as a pretty woman in new
sporting clothes.

"Your Uncle David and your Uncle Jimmie are going to be married," she
told her. "Did you know it, Eleanor?"

"No, I didn't," Eleanor said faintly, but she grew suddenly very
white.

"Aren't you surprised, dear? David gave a dinner party one night last
week in his studio, and announced his intentions, but we don't know
the name of the lady yet, and we can't guess it. He says it is not a
society girl."

"Who do you think it is?"

"Who do you think it is, Eleanor?"

"I--I can't think, Aunt Margaret."

"We don't know who Jimmie is marrying either. The facts were merely
insinuated, but he said we should have the shock of our lives when we
knew."

"When did he tell you?"

"A week ago last Wednesday. I haven't seen him since."

"Perhaps he has changed his mind by