ield, where the
tides of blossoming grass ebbed and flowed in chilly gusts of wind, they
reminded each other of the first time they had come there, and of every
detail of the elopement. When they sat down under the locust tree,
Eleanor opened her pocketbook and showed him the little grass ring,
lying flat and brittle in a small envelope; and he laughed, and said
when he got rich he would buy her a circle of emeralds!

"It's confoundedly cold," he said; "b-r-r! ... Oh, I must tell you the
news: I got one in on 'em at the office this morning: Old West has been
stung on a big block on Taylor Street. Nothing doing. No tenants. I've
been working on a fellow for a month, and, by George! I've landed him! I
told him the elevator service was rotten--and one or two other pretty
little things they've been sliding over, gracefully, at the office; but
I landed him! Say, Nelly, Morton asked me to go to a stag party to-morrow
night; do you mind if I go?"

She smiled vaguely at his truthtelling; then sighed, and said, "Why, no;
if you _want_ to. Maurice, do you remember you said we'd come back here
for our golden wedding?"

"So I did! I'd forgotten. Gosh! maybe we'll be grandparents by that
time!" The idea seemed to him infinitely humorous, but she winced. "What
a memory you have!" he said. "You ought to be in Weston's! They'd never
catch _you_ forgetting where some idiot left the key of the coal bin."

"I sang 'Kiss thy perfumed garments'; remember?"

"'Course I do. Hit 'em again."

She laughed, but ruefully; he had not spoken just that way a year ago.
She noticed, suddenly, how much older he looked than on that worshiping
day--still the blue, gay eyes, the wind-ruffled blond hair, the
hilarious laugh that displayed the very white teeth; but all the same he
looked older by more than one year: his mouth had a firmer line; his
whole clean-cut face showed responsibility and eager manhood.

Eleanor, clasping her hands around her knees, and watching the grass
ebbing and flowing in the wind, sang, "O Spring!" and Maurice,
listening, his eyes following the brown ripple of the river lisping in
the shallows around the sandbar, and flowing--flowing--like Life, and
Time, and Love, sighed with satisfaction at the pure beauty of her
voice. "The notes are like wings," he said; "give us a sandwich. I'm
about starved."

They spread out their luncheon, and Maurice expressed his opinion of it:
"This cake is the limit!" He threw a piece of it a