“It might be,” Miss Imogene replied. “That old colored woman is a great power among the servants and she could be of a great deal of help to any one who needed it. I don’t know what to think, and after all, honey, these Red Strings are very secret and we’ll probably never know for sure. Perhaps there wasn’t one about here at all.” “Mr. Stanchfield was so sure,” Dorothea began, but here they were interrupted, and the subject was dropped. That evening after Dorothea had gone to her room for the night there came a gentle knock at the door and she admitted Miss Imogene, who wore so radiant a smile that Dorothea gave her a hug before anything was said. “I don’t deserve it,” Miss Imogene whispered, “but I shall be very happy. The General has asked me to marry him.” “I’m so glad!” exclaimed Dorothea, nestling close to the dear little lady. “And you do deserve to be happy. You try to make every one happy around you.” “That’s sweet of you, honey,” Miss Imogene murmured. “I can only think of one more thing to wish for. You remember young Larry Stanchfield, don’t you?” “To be sure,” Dorothea answered, drawing back in her surprise. “I couldn’t forget him.” “I’m glad to hear you say that,” Miss Imogene said quickly, “because, my dear, it would be so nice if—” she hesitated an instant, “if some day you were my niece instead of my cousin.” Dorothea blushed. “I’m afraid, Cousin Imogene, I can’t be that, unless—unless you adopt Val Tracy for a nephew. You see,” Dorothea went on hurriedly, “Val and I were both mixed up. He thought I was in love with Larry Stanchfield, and that’s the reason he saved him that time, though an Irishman, of course, hates an informer above anything. And I thought he was in love with April; but he wasn’t, and—well, it all came out that day we rescued Lee Hendon, and—and I’m all mixed up, too, about what I’ll be when I marry Val; because now I’m half English and half American, and then I’ll be Irish too, I suppose.” “No, my dear,” Miss Imogene replied as she took the girl in her arms. “You’ll be all American, both of you. Now that our country is to be united again we can take in all the nationalities, and the Irish, honey, make very good Americans! I think we’ll have to arrange for a double wedding? What do think?” “I think it would be lovely!” replied Dorothea. THE END ------------------------------------------------------------------------ The following pages contain advertisements of Macmillan books for boys and girls. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ OTHER BOOKS BY MR. AND MRS. KNIPE THE GIRL PATRIOT SERIES “Since there will be historical fiction as long as there are new generations to learn history, it is fortunate for the present generation of young readers that they have Mr. and Mrs. Knipe to write some of their historical stories for them.”—Daily Advertiser, Boston.