“Why did you not answer my letters, Gertie?” “Your letters, Godfrey! What letters? I never received a line from you,” Gertie said, while Godfrey rejoined: “Never received a line from me! That is very strange!—and I wrote to you three different times. Think, Gertie,—try to recall it. Fours years ago, when you first went to school, and I came home and found you gone, I wrote from here how disappointed I was not to see you, and asked you to correspond with me, and let me be your brother. You were my little sister, I said; I adopted you as such, and I said a heap more _soft nothings_, as Alice might call them, though I was very much in earnest at the time, and to myself called you ‘_La Sœur_’ always. And you never received that letter?” “Never, Godfrey. I should remember that, and you say you wrote again?” “Yes, from Andover; and sent my photograph, and asked for yours in return, and bet fifty dollars with some students that I’d show them the handsomest picture they ever saw, and I waited so anxiously for it; but it never came, and at last I wrote again, and told you to go to thunder! I did, upon my word, I felt so piqued and slighted, and I said I meant to go to the bad, and smoke, and drink, and swear, and do everything I could think of.” “Oh, Godfrey, Godfrey! You didn’t, though, I hope!” Gertie cried, while her fingers tightened around the hand holding them so fast. “Yes, I did,—for a little while. I drank a lot of wine, which went to my head, and smoked three cigars, which went to my stomach, and made me feel worse than sea-sickness, if that were possible. I was crazy as a loon, and smashed everything in my room, and sang uproarious songs; and, when one of the tutors came to see what was up, I called him a fool, and threw the wash-bowl at his head. Of course I was reprimanded, and reported to father, who came to see about it, and paid for the furniture, and talked so good that I promised to do better, and I did. And you say you never received those letters?” “Never, Godfrey. I should have answered them,” Gertie said, while Godfrey continued: “And if you had, Gertie,—I might,—oh, who knows what might have been!” He was holding both her hands and looking down upon her as no man ought to look upon a girl when he is engaged to another. Some such thought as this must have crossed Gertie’s mind, for she released herself from him suddenly, and said: “It is very late, Godfrey. I must go in now.” “No, Gertie, please,” and he still tried to detain her. “Wait a little longer. I am yours to-night; to-morrow I am some one’s else, and must come under orders, you know.” He spoke ironically, and then as he saw that Gertie was really leaving him, he continued: “By the way, Gertie, one thing more, and you may go. Do you remember the forlorn sick little girl who sat on the deck years ago, and the bold, impudent fellow who made her so angry, and the promise she gave him on certain conditions?”