“My, yes, awful ones, that I have to give right up to. Evelina has to do everything when I have one of them headaches. She has to bring me my tea in the mornings.” “Well, I'm sorry to hear it,” said Mr. Ramy. “Thank you kindly all the same,” Ann Eliza murmured. “And please don't--don't--” She stopped suddenly, looking at him through her tears. “Oh, that's all right,” he answered. “Don't you fret, Miss Gunner. Folks have got to suit themselves.” She thought his tone had grown more resigned since she had spoken of her headaches. For some moments he stood looking at her with a hesitating eye, as though uncertain how to end their conversation; and at length she found courage to say (in the words of a novel she had once read): “I don't want this should make any difference between us.” “Oh, my, no,” said Mr. Ramy, absently picking up his hat. “You'll come in just the same?” she continued, nerving herself to the effort. “We'd miss you awfully if you didn't. Evelina, she--” She paused, torn between her desire to turn his thoughts to Evelina, and the dread of prematurely disclosing her sister's secret. “Don't Miss Evelina have no headaches?” Mr. Ramy suddenly asked. “My, no, never--well, not to speak of, anyway. She ain't had one for ages, and when Evelina IS sick she won't never give in to it,” Ann Eliza declared, making some hurried adjustments with her conscience. “I wouldn't have thought that,” said Mr. Ramy. “I guess you don't know us as well as you thought you did.” “Well, no, that's so; maybe I don't. I'll wish you good day, Miss Bunner”; and Mr. Ramy moved toward the door. “Good day, Mr. Ramy,” Ann Eliza answered. She felt unutterably thankful to be alone. She knew the crucial moment of her life had passed, and she was glad that she had not fallen below her own ideals. It had been a wonderful experience; and in spite of the tears on her cheeks she was not sorry to have known it. Two facts, however, took the edge from its perfection: that it had happened in the shop, and that she had not had on her black silk. She passed the next hour in a state of dreamy ecstasy. Something had entered into her life of which no subsequent empoverishment could rob it: she glowed with the same rich sense of possessorship that once, as a little girl, she had felt when her mother had given her a gold locket and she had sat up in bed in the dark to draw it from its hiding-place beneath her night-gown.