ght for her," he said abruptly. "I should hate
for her to be hurt."

While he talked it seemed to Corinna that she was living in some absurd
comedy, which mimicked life but was only acting, not reality. In her
world of reserves and implications no man would have dared to make
himself ridiculous by a visit like this.

"Do you believe that she cares for Stephen?" she asked bluntly.

"It didn't start with me. Miss Spencer, that's the lady who lives with
us you know, is afraid that Patty sees too much of him. He is at the
house every day--"

"Well?" Corinna waited patiently. She was not in the least afraid of
what Stephen might do. She knew that she could trust him to be a
gentleman; but being a gentleman, she reflected, did not necessarily
keep one from breaking a woman's heart. And Patty had a wild, free heart
that might be broken.

"I don't know what to do about it," Vetch was saying while she pondered
the problem. "As I told you a minute ago this is all outside my job."

"Have you spoken to Patty?"

"I started to, but she made fun of the idea--you know the way she has.
She asked me if I had ever heard of any one falling in love with a
plaster saint?"

Corinna smiled. "So she called Stephen a plaster saint?"

"She was chaffing, of course."

"Well, I don't see that there is anything you can do unless you send
Patty away."

"She wouldn't go," he responded simply; then after a moment of
embarrassed hesitation, he blurted out nervously, "Is this young
Culpeper what you would call a marrying man?"

This time it was impossible for Corinna to suppress her amusement, and
it broke out in a laugh that was like the chiming of silver bells. Oh,
if only Cousin Harriet could hear him! Then observing the gravity of
Vetch's expression, she checked her untimely mirth with an effort.

"That depends, I suppose. At his age how can any one tell?" In her heart
she did not believe that Stephen would marry Patty; she was not sure
even that she, Corinna, should wish him to do so. There was too much at
stake, and though her philosophy was fearless, her conduct had never
been anything but conventional. While in theory she despised discretion,
she realized that the virtue she despised, not the theory she admired,
had dominated her life. The great trouble with acts of reckless nobility
was that the recklessness was only for a moment, but the nobility was
obliged to last a lifetime. It was not difficult, she knew, for persons
like St