"To people? Nothing--or what you please. I will tell grandfather myself, to-night--and Aunt Serena. I shall tell them that you have behaved extremely well, and that it was all my fault. Or no! I shall tell them that we both found out that we had been mistaken, for I think that that is the truth. And that we have had an explanation, and are now and for always just well-wishers and common friends and nothing more. I am going to try--I think that now maybe I can do it--to get grandfather to treat you properly. There is nobody else here whose business it is, or who knows anything about it--and you have only three days anyway. There are some pleasant people, and you'll meet them. It isn't going to be awkward, indeed, it isn't--" "By George!" said Laydon, "if you aren't the coolest.... Of course, if this is the way you feel, it may be wisest not to link my life with--Naturally a man wants entire love, admiration, and confidence--" "Just so," said Hagar. "And you'll find some one to feel all that. And now let's walk to the New Springs." CHAPTER XIII THE NEW SPRINGS Laydon's three days spun themselves out to five with a fine smoothness. Colonel Ashendyne's tone was balm itself to what it might have been. Miss Serena was willing to discuss with him "In Memoriam" and the novels of Miss Broughton, and Ralph Coltsworth who was also at the New Springs walked with him over the place. Laydon was keen enough to see that Hagar had appealed to her family, and that Ashendyne breeding had rallied to her support. He was at once provoked and soothed; now conscious only of the injury to his healthy self-love, and now of a vague relief that, young as he still was, and with that wonderful future all to make, he really was not tied down. His very vanity would not agree but that the woman with whom he had thought himself in love must be of a superior type and an undeniable charm, but the same vanity conceded gently that to err was mortal, and that there were as good fish in the sea as ever came out of it, and that he certainly had not been fatally smitten--on the whole, she, poor little thing! had probably suffered the most of the two. Charming as she was, the glamour for him, he conceded, was gone. _He had come off pretty well, after all._ When the five days were up, he felt positive regret at having to go, and his good-bye to all the Ashendynes was cordial. He had already written to Mrs. LeGrand, and, of course, to his mother. He went; the stage took him up the mountain.... "For all I could see--and I watched pretty closely--there didn't anything come of it," remarked Marie Caton. "On the whole, I am rather glad. Now you can't hear the rumble of the stage any longer. He's gone out of the picture.--Betsy, stop writing and look at the robin and the chipmunk--"