"Honestly? Oh, but it will be glorious to be Mrs. First Lieutenant Mallory." "Glorious!" "I must telegraph home--and sign my new name. Won't mamma be pleased?" "Won't she?" said Mallory, with just a trace of dubiety. Then Marjorie grew serious with a new idea: "I wonder if mamma and papa have missed me yet?" Mallory laughed: "After three days' disappearance, I shouldn't be surprised." "Perhaps they are worrying about me." "I shouldn't be surprised." "The poor dears! I'd better write them a telegram at once." "An excellent idea." She ran to the desk, found blank forms and then paused with knitted brow: "It will be very hard to say all I've got to say in ten words." "Hang the expense," Mallory sniffed magnificently, "I'm paying your bills now." But Marjorie tried to look very matronly: "Send a night letter in the day time! No, indeed, we must begin to economize." Mallory was touched by this new revelation of her future housewifely thrift. He hugged her hard and reminded her that she could send a day-letter by wire. "An excellent idea," she said. "Now, don't bother me. You go on and read your paper, read about Mattie. I'll never be jealous of her--him--of anybody--again." "You shall never have cause for jealousy, my own." But fate was not finished with the initiation of the unfortunate pair, and already new trouble was strolling in their direction. CHAPTER XXIX JEALOUSY COMES ABOARD There was an air of domestic peace in the observation room, where Mallory and Marjorie had been left to themselves for some time. But the peace was like the ominous hush that precedes a tempest. Mallory was so happy with everything coming his way, that he was even making up with Snoozleums, stroking the tatted coat with one hand and holding up his newspaper with the other. He did not know all that was coming his way. The blissful silence was broken first by Marjorie: "How do you spell Utah?--with a y?" "Utah begins with You," he said--and rather liked his wit, listened for some recognition, and rose to get it, but she waved him away. "Don't bother me, honey. Can't you see I'm busy?" He kissed her hair and sauntered back, dividing his attention between Snoozleums and the ten-inning game. And now there was a small commotion in the smoking room. Through the glass along the corridor the men caught sight of the girl who had got on at Green River. Ashton saw her first and she saw him. "There she goes," Ashton hissed to the others, "look quick! There's the nectarine." "My word! She's a little bit of all right, isn't she?" Even Dr. Temple stared at her with approval: "Dear little thing, isn't she?" The girl, very consciously unconscious of the admiration, moved demurely along, with eyes downcast, but at such an angle that she could take in the sensation she was creating; she went along picking up stares as if they were bouquets.