"Now you must sit down and rest," said Mrs. Jasper. "And if you are very obedient, you may get up in that Spanish dance. I think that quite delightful and bewildering." A lady sat on the other side of Mrs. Jasper, and resumed the incident she was describing. Mr. Jasper came up with a young man. "Here is an old friend!" he exclaimed. "Where is Daisy?" "Somewhere with the Doctor. Oh, what a surprise!" and she took the young man's hand. "I wasn't sure I could get here; and it would have been very ungrateful to Mr. Jasper, when he sent me a ticket. I wanted to see Miss Daisy again. But I have just come on a flying business tour, and must start to-morrow for Philadelphia. Still, I may have a little leisure when I return. What a gay scene." Hanny sat fanning herself, and feeling that her cheeks were scarlet. If it only wouldn't culminate in her nose! Then Mr. Jasper turned and introduced his young friend. Hanny moved a little, so he could sit between her and Mrs. Jasper,--a very attractive young man, a Mr. Andersen. "Miss Underhill," he repeated, as Mr. Jasper turned away, "I've been speculating on a Miss Underhill for five minutes. I wonder if you will consider it impertinent; but perhaps you never speculate upon people, and then it might be reprehensible. Just as I entered the room, there was a merry group talking, and a sort of 'nut brown mayde,' all in brown and yellow with bright hair and laughing eyes said, 'Miss Nan Underhill.' Of course I was too well bred, and in too great a hurry to listen to any more, or I might have found out about her. I had just an instant interior gleam of what she must be like with that English name. And I wonder if the fates have directed my steps to her?" Mr. Andersen was not the tall, stern, gloomy hero of romance; he was medium in height and figure, with a frank, eager sort of face, dark hair, and eyes she thought black then, but afterwards came to know that they were of the deep blue of a midnight sky in winter. He had such a smiling mouth, and his voice had a curious, lingering cadence that suggests that one may have heard it in a previous state. Hanny caught the spirit of the half badinage, and the laughing light in his face. "I think I ought to know the ideal before I confess identity," she replied. "Can't I change the ideal? Or repent my vague, wild fancy?" "Oh, was it wild? Then I must insist upon it. Miss Nan Underhill, an English girl; of course she was tall, this vision of your imagination?" Hanny was quite sure her face grew redder. And this ideal girl was beautiful. Oh, dear! "Yes, tall; a daughter of the gods, or the old Norse Vikings before they were Anglicised, with fair hair. And you have the fair hair." "But I am not tall! I am sorry to have you disappointed." "I am not disappointed. What does a vagrant fancy amount to? I consider myself fortunate in meeting Miss Underhill. Why, suppose I had gone rambling about and missed you altogether? Have you known the Jaspers long?"