There were some pretty gifts for her at home. Josie Dean and Charlie Reed came around in the evening. He had passed his first year's examinations successfully. Doctor Joe and Jim and the elder people were talking very earnestly about the duties and the purposes of life. Josie touched Hanny's hand, and, with a little movement, the sign girls understand, drew her out on the porch. "Let us walk down the path. Oh, Hanny, I've something to tell you!" and her voice was in a sort of delicious tremble. "May be you have suspected. I told Charlie I _must_ confess it to you; though we do not mean to say much about it at present. Oh, Hanny, can't you guess?" There were so many things; it was something joyful, certainly. She glanced up and smiled. Josie's face was all one roseate flush. "Oh!" with a mysterious throb. "We are engaged, dear. I don't know when we began to love each other. We have been so much with each other, you know. He has helped me with my lessons; and we have sung, and played, and read, and gone to church together. It was like having a brother. Tudie and I used to envy you the boys. And it was not quite like a brother either, for another feeling came in. Sometimes I wanted to run away, such a queer tremble came over me. Then there were hours when I could hardly wait for him to come home from the seminary. And for a while, he was so grave, I wondered if I had offended him. And then--do you suppose any one can tell just _how_ it happens?--though they always do in books. All in an instant, you know some one loves you. It's strange and beautiful and exciting; and it seems as if the best and loveliest of all the world had come to you. We have been engaged a whole week; and every day it grows more mysteriously delightful." "It is so strange," said Hanny, with a long, indrawn breath. "And--Charlie!"