Elizabeth began to get restless again; it was perfectly impossible for her to keep quiet any length of time that day, and she made some excuse for leaving them. "Let me go with you," said Mrs. Harrington; "I know you are going to order luncheon, and I should so like to get a peep at your kitchen; it is a perfect Flemish picture." "Particularly the crowd of dusky faces," said Elsie. "Mary Harrington, you're a humbug." "I am sure she is quite right," said Tom, anxious to insure her departure; "I was in the kitchen one day and it looked as picturesque as Niagara." Elsie perfectly understood the motive which led him to speak, and hastened to rejoin: "If you think it so stupendous you had better accompany them, and get another peep." "No," said Tom; "I might disturb the colored persons; I'll stay where I am." "Bless me," cried Elsie; "what consideration! You will be bursting into unpremeditated poetry about the dark future, before we know it." "Oh, Elsie," said Mrs. Harrington, "what a provoking creature you are." She followed Elizabeth out of the room, and Tom was alone at last with his idol. "Are you sorry I am going?" he asked. "Do I look so?" she asked. "No, you don't." "Well, looks can't tell fibs," said she, provokingly. "Oh, Elsie, be good to me now; just think; I shall be gone a whole week!" "It's a calamity I dare not contemplate," replied she. "Now, whatever you do, don't break your neck in those horrid coal mines, or come back smelling of brimstone like a theatrical fiend." "I believe you would jest during an earthquake." "If it would stop the thing shaking I might," she answered. "There, there, don't be cross, Tom." Elsie threw down her work, and with one of her quick changes of manner brought her lover back to serenity. "If you would only let me do one thing before I go," he said, getting courage enough from her kindness to propose an idea that had been in his mind ever since he arrived. "What is it, _Monsieur Exigeant_?" "Just let me tell Grant of our--our--" "Our what, stammerer?" "Of the happiness you have promised me," said Tom, changing the original word from fear of vexing her. "You were going to say engagement; don't deny it." "And aren't we engaged?" he pleaded. "Not a bit of it, Mr. Tom Fuller; I am just as free as air; please to remember that." "Oh, Elsie!" "And Elsie oh!" cried she. "But it's true! You said all sorts of foolish things about love, and I let you talk, but what right have you to say we are engaged?" Tom instantly became so nervous that he could not sit still. "Oh, Elsie, Elsie, how can you?" he pleaded. "Now, aren't you deliciously miserable," said Elsie; "that is the way I like to see you; it's your duty, sir." "I wouldn't think you so cruel at such a time." "Oh, wouldn't you? And pray what right have you to think at all; no man has a right; that's another female privilege." "You are worse than the Women's Rights people," said he.