Alice stood talking with a girl of her own age and two or three undergraduates, on the outskirts of the crowd. One of the youths wore in his buttonhole the losing color, but he bore himself with a proud dignity that forbade casual condolences. Alice's eyes were bright, and her pretty laugh rippled forth with readily communicated mirth, while the very roses of her hat nodded with the spirit of unthinking gayety. "There's the car that belongs to our fellows," said, half to himself, the person of sympathies alien to those of his present companions. "They must be about--yes, they're getting on," he added, as a car which had been propelled from a neighboring switch stopped at the farther end of the station. Alice's head turned with a swiftness of motion that set the roses vibrating as if a sudden breeze had ruffled their petals. "The crew?" she asked. "Yes," assented the young man. She turned more definitely towards him, away from the rest of the group, whose attention was called in another direction. "Will you do something for me, Mr. Francis?" "Why, of course." Alice had not anticipated refusal, and her directions were prompt and lucid. "Please go into that car and ask Mr. Herbert to come out to the platform, at the other end, to speak to me. There isn't much time to lose, so please be quick." As he lifted his hat and moved away, she joined in the conversation of the others, which seemed to be largely metaphorical. "So he got it that time," one of the young men was explaining, "where Katy wore the beads." "Well, it served him quite right," said Alice, with the generosity of ignorance. Her whole attention was apparently given to the matter in hand, but she was standing so that she could see the somewhat vague vestibule of the brilliant but curtained car. "Oh, yes, but it wasn't on the tintype that the other fellow should have been there at all." "No, to be sure, but that made it all the better," said Alice's friend, with sympathetic vision. "Why, there's Eugene Herbert!" exclaimed Alice. "I really must go and tell him that he pulled beautifully, if he didn't win, and comforting things like that! Don't go off without me." Before comment could be framed upon their lips, she had left her companions and was slipping quickly down the platform. "She knows him very well," said the other girl; "she'll be back in a minute." "She must have sharp eyes," said another of the group, as he looked after her. But too many people were about for fixed attention to be bestowed upon a single figure. There was but one light under the roof of that part of the station where a young man was standing, looking rather sulkily up and down. Alice was a little breathless with her rapid walk when she reached him. "I thought Francis was giving me a song and dance," he said, as he grasped the hand she held out. "No, I sent him," she explained hurriedly. "And I wanted to say--" She paused an instant as she looked up at him.