with her
elbows there. Paul noticed this with a curious feeling of unease, and
then called softly again, "Patricia!"

No answer. He walked hesitatingly to his own room and to the window.
Why he should have looked down at the dark path with the expectation of
seeing her, he did not know; but it was almost without surprise that he
recognized the familiar white ruffles and dark head moving away in the
gloom. Paul unhesitatingly followed.

He followed her down the trail as far as he had seen her go, and was
standing, a little undecidedly, wondering just which way she had
turned, when his heart was suddenly brought into his throat by the
sound of her bitter sobbing.

A moment later he saw her. She was sitting on a smooth fallen trunk,
and had buried her face in her hands. Paul had never heard such sobs;
they seemed to shake her from head to foot. Hardly would they lessen,
bringing him the hope that her grief, whatever it was, was wearing
itself out, when a fresh paroxysm would shake her, and she would
abandon herself to it. This lasted for what seemed a long, long time.

After a while Paul cleared his throat, but she did not hear him. And
again he stood motionless, waiting and waiting. Finally, when she
straightened up and began to mop her eyes, he said, trembling a little:

"Patricia!"

Instantly she stopped crying.

"Who is that?" she said, with an astonishing control of her voice. "Is
that you, Alan? I'm all right, dear. Did I frighten you? Is that you,
Alan?"

"It's Paul," the boy said, coming nearer.

"Oh--Paul!" she said, relieved. "Does Alan know I'm here?"

"No," he reassured her; then, affectionately: "What is it, Pat?"

"Just--just that I happen to be a fool!" she said huskily, but with an
effort at lightness. Paul sat down, beginning to see in the darkness.
"I'm all right now," went on Patricia, hardily. "I just--I suppose I
just had the blues." She put out a smooth hand in the darkness, and
patted Paul's appreciatively. "I'm ashamed of myself!" said she,
catching a little sob, as she spoke, like a child.

"Bad news--in your letters?" he hazarded.

"No, GOOD; that's the trouble!" she said, with her whimsical smile, but
with trembling lips. "You see, all my friends are in the East, and some
of them happened to be at the same house-party at Newport, and
they--they were saying how they missed me," her voice shook a little,
"and--and it seems they toasted me, all standing, and--and--" And
suddenly she