grave." She pinned the picture of Eloise
to the frame of her mirror when she went to her room that night, and
studied it while she slowly brushed her hair.

Once she paused with brush in air as a comforting thought suddenly
occurred to her. "Why, I'm in the same position that Phil is. Pink
doesn't measure up to my highest ideal of a man any more than Eliza
measures up to Lloyd, but he's my chief source of amusement here, just
as she is Phil's there. Maybe she lets him see that she's fond of his
company and all that, and he hates to hurt her feelings as I hate to
hurt Pink's. I'll intimate as much in my letter when I answer his
questions, if I can think of the right way to do it."

It was because she could not find the right words to express these
sentiments that she delayed answering from day to day, then other things
crowded it out of her mind. The Valentine party required that much time
and thought be spent on the costumes, and she helped Jack with his. He
went as a comic Valentine. Pink begged her to dress as the Queen of
Hearts, and she was almost persuaded to do so, thinking that would be
the easiest of costumes to prepare, till she guessed from something he
let fall that he intended to personate the King himself. Then nothing
would have induced her to do it. She knew it would give occasion for
the coupling of their names together in the familiar and teasing way
they have in little country towns.

So she dressed as an old-fashioned lace-paper valentine. The dress was
made of a much-mended lace curtain. The front of the bodice had two
square lapels wired at the edges, so that they could be folded together
like the front of a real valentine, or opened back like shutters to show
on her breast a panel of pale blue satin, on which was outlined two
white doves perched above a great red heart. Mrs. Ware painted it, and
although it may sound queer in the description, it was in reality a very
pretty costume, and the touch of color made it so becoming that Mary's
cheeks glowed with pleasure many times during the evening at the
comments she overheard on all sides.

Pink's eyes followed her admiringly everywhere she went, but he had
little to say to her, except once, as he finished singing a song which
Sara Downs had begged for, he leaned over and whispered significantly,
"That's _your_ song."

It was Kathleen Mavourneen, and she wondered why he called it hers. On
the way home he was so strangely silent that Mary wondere