ngs the next day.

It was late at night when the party returned. The carriage drove to the
Benson cottage; King helped Irene to alight, coolly bade her good-night,
and went to his barracks. But it was not a good night to sleep. He
tossed about, he counted every step of the late night birds on his
gallery; he got up and lighted a cigar, and tried dispassionately to
think the matter over. But thinking was of no use. He took pen and
paper; he would write a chill letter of farewell; he would write a manly
avowal of his passion; he would make such an appeal that no woman could
resist it. She must know, she did know--what was the use of writing? He
sat staring at the blank prospect. Great heavens! what would become of
his life if he lost the only woman in the world? Probably the world
would go on much the same. Why, listen to it! The band was playing on
the lawn at four o'clock in the morning. A party was breaking up after a
night of german and a supper, and the revelers were dispersing. The
lively tunes of "Dixie," "Marching through Georgia," and "Home, Sweet
Home," awoke the echoes in all the galleries and corridors, and filled
the whole encampment with a sad gayety. Dawn was approaching.
Good-nights and farewells and laughter were heard, and the voice of a
wanderer explaining to the trees, with more or less broken melody, his
fixed purpose not to go home till morning.

Stanhope King might have had a better though still a sleepless night if
he had known that Mr. Meigs was packing his trunks at that hour to the
tune of "Home, Sweet Home," and if he had been aware of the scene at the
Benson cottage after he bade Irene good-night. Mrs. Benson had a light
burning, and the noise of the carriage awakened her. Irene entered the
room, saw that her mother was awake, shut the door carefully, sat down on
the foot of the bed, said, "It's all over, mother," and burst into the
tears of a long-repressed nervous excitement.

"What's over, child?" cried Mrs. Benson, sitting bolt-upright in bed.

"Mr. Meigs. I had to tell him that it couldn't be. And he is one of the
best men I ever knew."

"You don't tell me you've gone and refused him, Irene?"

"Please don't scold me. It was no use. He ought to have seen that I did
not care for him, except as a friend. I'm so sorry!"

"You are the strangest girl I ever saw." And Mrs. Benson dropped back on
the pillow again, crying herself now, and muttering, "I'm sure I don't
know what you do want."