"When I was a little girl," said Joe, "mamma used to tell me a story about the beautiful Snow Angel: she must have been just like you, dear." "What is the story?" asked Sybil, the delicate color in her cheek deepening a little. "I will tell you to-night when we are skating, we have not time now. Here we are." And the two girls went up the steps of the house where they were going to lunch. On the other side of the street Pocock Vancouver and John Harrington met, and stopped to speak just as Joe and Sybil had rung the bell, and stood waiting at the head of the steps. "Don't let us look at each other so long as we can look at them," said Vancouver, shaking hands with John, but looking across the street at the two girls. John looked too, and both men bowed. "They are pretty enough for anything, are they not?" continued Vancouver. "Yes," said John, "they are very pretty." With a nod and a smile Joe and Sybil disappeared into the house. "Why don't you marry her?" asked Vancouver. "Which? The English girl?" "No; Sybil Brandon." "Thank you, I am not thinking of being married," said John, a half-comic, half-contemptuous look in his strong face. "Miss Brandon could do better than marry a penniless politician, and besides, even if I wanted it, I care too much for Miss Brandon's friendship to risk losing it by asking her to marry me." "Nonsense, my dear fellow," said Vancouver, "she would accept you straight off. So would the other." "You ought to know," said John, eyeing his companion calmly. Vancouver looked away; it was generally believed that he had been refused by Miss Brandon more than a year previous. "Well, you can take my word for it, you could not do better," he answered, ambiguously. "There is no knowing how the moonlight effects on Jamaica Pond may strike you this evening. I say, though, you were pretty lucky in having such warm weather the night before last." "Yes," said John. "The house was full. Were you there?" "Of course. If I were not a Republican I would congratulate you on your success. It is a long time since any one has made a Boston audience listen to those opinions. You did it surprisingly well; that sentence about protection was a masterpiece. I wish you were one of us." "It is of no use arguing with you," said John. "If it were, I could make a Democrat of you in an afternoon." "I make a pretty good thing of arguing, though," answered the other. "It's my trade, you see, and it is not yours. You lay down the law; it is my business to make a living out of it." "I wish I _could_ lay it down, as you say, and lay it down according to my own ideas," said John. "I would have something to say to you railroad men." "As for that, I should not care. Railroad law is stronger than iron and more flexible than india-rubber, and the shape of it is of no importance whatever. So long as there is enough of it to work with, you can twist it and untwist it as much as you please." John laughed.