elle, and she skated on in silence.

"You came down with Alonzo Ringdove?" Bill asked, suddenly, aware of
another pang after a moment of peace.

"He came with me and his sisters," she replied.

Yes; poor Ringdove had dressed himself in his shiniest black, put on his
brightest patent-leather boots, with his new swan-necked skates newly
strapped over them, and wore his new dove-colored overcoat with the long
skirts, on purpose to be lovely in the eyes of Belle on this occasion.
Alas, in vain!

"Mr. Ringdove is a great friend of yours, isn't he?"

"If you ever came to see me now, you would know who my friends are, Mr.
Tarbox."

"Would you be my friend again, if I came, Miss Belle?"

"Again? I have always been so,--always, Bill."

"Well, then, something more than my friend,--now that I am trying to be
worthy of more, Belle?"

"What more can I be?" she said, softly.

"My wife."

She curved to the right. He followed. To the left. He was not to be shaken
off.

"Will you promise me not to say _walves_ instead of _valves_, Bill?" she
said, looking pretty and saucy as could be. "I know, to say W for V is
fashionable in the iron business; but I don't like it."

"What a thing a woman is to dodge!" says Bill. "Suppose I told you that
men brought up inside of boilers, hammering on the inside against twenty
hammering like Wulcans on the outside, get their ears so dumfounded that
they can't tell whether they are saying _valves_ or _walves_, _wice_ or
_virtue_,--suppose I told you that,--what would you say, Belle?"

"Perhaps I'd say that you pronounce _virtue_ so well, and act it so
sincerely, that I can't make any objection to your other words. If you'd
asked me to be your _vife_, Bill, I might have said I didn't understand;
but _wife_ I do understand, and I say"--

She nodded, and tried to skate off. Bill stuck close to her side.

"Is this true, Belle?" he said, almost doubtfully.

"True as truth!"

She put out her hand. He took it, and they skated on together,--hearts
beating to the rhythm of their movements. The uproar and merriment of the
village came only faintly to them. It seemed as if all Nature was hushed
to listen to their plighted troth, their words of love renewed, more
earnest for long suppression. The beautiful ice spread before them, like
their life to come, a pathway untouched by any sorrowful or weary
footstep. The blue sky was cloudless. The keen air stirred the pulses like
the vapor of frozen w