"It fell on the cement floor," Florence reported, peering into the window. "It'll go out pretty soon." "Then I suppose we might as well do the same thing," said Newland, addressing Julia first and Mr. Dill second. "Miss Atwater and I are just starting for a walk." Mr. Ridgely also addressed the new arrival. "Miss Atwater and I are just starting for a walk." "You see, Noble," said the kind-hearted Julia, "I did tell you I had another engagement." "I came by here," Mr. Dill began in a tone commingling timidity, love, and a fatal stubbornness; "I came by here--I mean I just happened to be passing--and I thought if it was a walking-_party_, well, why not go along? That's the way it struck me." He paused, coughing for courage and trying to look easily genial, but not succeeding; then he added, "Well, as I say, that's the way it struck me--as it were. I suppose we might as well be starting." "Yes, we might," Newland Sanders said quickly; and he placed himself at Julia's left, seizing upon her parasol and opening it with determination. Mr. Ridgely had kept himself closely at the lady's right. "You were mistaken, my boy," he said, falsely benevolent. "It isn't a party--though there's Miss Florence, Noble. Nobody's asked her to go walking to-day!" Now, Florence took this satire literally. She jumped up and said brightly: "I just as soon! Let's _do_ have a walking-party. I just as soon walk with Mr. Dill as anybody, and we can all keep together, kind of." With that, she stepped confidently to the side of her selected escort, who appeared to be at a loss how to avert her kindness. There was a moment of hesitation, during which a malevolent pleasure slightly disfigured the countenances of the two gentlemen with Julia; but when Florence pointed to a house across the street and remarked, "There's Great-Uncle Milford and Aunt C'nelia; they been lookin' out of their second guestroom window about half an hour," Julia uttered an exclamation. "Murder!" she said, and moved with decision toward the gate. "Let's go!"