"When you were a little girl you once said to Hanny if you could have a brother out of the clan you would like it to be me. And for days the quaint, generous little soul could hardly resolve whether it was not her duty to give me away. Then don't you remember you both planned to come and keep my bachelor-home? Some one else will take her. And we will wait, dear. We will go on in the same friendly, kindly fashion. You must run in and out and come to me with your headaches and perplexities, and I shall scold you a little and give you a bitter tonic; and when everything is just right I shall ask you to marry me; but all the time I shall be loving you so much that it will be impossible for you to refuse me. So you know what is in store, and no one need trouble about the future. You are not engaged, you are quite free; and, like Ben, I will wait seven years or twenty years for you. But I think you never can belong to any one else." Ah, what delightful security! "Dear, dear Doctor Joe. Oh, it would be too much happiness! No, I ought not; mamma thinks I ought not to marry. And," raising her head and showing a face full of scarlet flushes and tears, and eyes shining with love's own light, "it looks just as if I had come in here and really asked you to marry me. We have forgotten all about poor Jim. You will think me a coquette, and you ought to despise me." His clasp tightened a little. "I am sorry that Jim should have been so heedless. Perhaps it will be better to let him learn how much in earnest you are with your refusal. It may not be flattering to a young girl to think a man will forget her." "But I want him to forget that part," she interrupted eagerly. "I think he will. And if he comes to me for comfort, I will try to be a wise father-confessor. And yet I can't help pitying the man a little who will lose you. Only in this case it would be like having an exotic without a conservatory, and not quite knowing how to build one." "Joseph!" his mother called from upstairs. Daisy sprang up and smoothed her ruffled plumes, Joe gave her one long, dear kiss, and she flashed out of the little room. She held her head very high. It was the most splendid thing that could happen to a girl; but she was not going to spoil her dear Doctor Joe's life. Are there days that the Lord of all the earth has created for love? Some days seem made especially for sorrow. But this had such an exquisite serenity brooding in the air. It was not late enough to have any regrets for the passing of summer, and oh, what a summer it had been! "Do you really want to go up to the fair?" Herman Andersen had asked, when they reached the corner. "Why,--" Hanny hesitated,--"we have seen it a good many times," and she gave her soft, rippling laugh. "Let us go over to Tompkin's Square." He had something to say to her that would be easier said in those deserted walks. You could always find them except on Saturday or Sunday. "Very well," with her graceful assent.