"I don't want, Hattie, you should wait up for that child and take your death of cold. Because I sleep like a log when I once hit the bed, don't you play no tricks on me." "I'll be up in a minute, I.W." He moved into the house and, after a while, to the clinking of ice against glass, up the stairs. "Come, Hattie; and be sure and leave the screen door unhooked for her." "Yes, I.W." An hour she sat in the shrouded darkness of the elbow of the veranda. Street noises died. The smell of damp came out. Occasionally a motor-car sped by, or a passer-by, each step clear on the asphalt. The song of crickets grated against the darkness. An infant in the right-side house raised a fretful voice once or twice, and then broke into a sustained and coughy fit of crying. Lights flashed up in the windows, silhouettes moving across drawn shades. Then silence again. The university clock, a mile out, chimed twelve, and finally a sonorous one. Mrs. Goldstone lay huddled in her chair, vibrant for sound. At two o'clock the long, high-power car drew up at the curb again, this time without honking. She sat forward, trembling. There followed a half-hour of voices at the curb, a low voice of undeniable tensity, high laughter that shot up in joyous geysers. It was a fifteen-minute process from the curb to the first of the porch steps, and then Mrs. Goldstone leaned forward, her voice straining to keep its pitch. "Effie!" The young figure sprang around the porch pillar. "Mamma Hat! Honey, you didn't wait up for me?" Mr. Kessler came forward, goggles pushed up above his cap-visor. "Well, I'm hanged! What did you think--that I was kidnapping the kid?" "How--how dared you! It's after two, and--" Miss Goldstone began then to jump again upon her toes, linking her arm in his. "Tell her, Leon! Tell her! Oh, Mamma Hat! Mamma Hat!" She was suddenly in Mrs. Goldstone's arms, her ardent face burning through the white wrapper. Mr. Kessler removed his cap, flinging it upward again and catching it. "Tell her, Leon!" "Well, what would you say, Becker, what would you say if I was to come out here and swipe that little darling there?" "Oh, Leon--kidder!" "If--what?" "I said it!" "Tell her, Kess; tell it out! Oh, mommie, mommie!" He leaned forward with his hand on the back of the turbulent head of curls. "You little darling, I'm going to put you on my back and carry you off to New York." "Oh, mommie," cried Miss Goldstone, flinging back her head so that her face shone up, "he asked me in Delmar Garden! We're going to live in New York, darling, and Rockaway in summer. He don't care a rap about the New York girls compared to me. We're going to Cuba on our honeymoon. I'm engaged, darling! I got engaged to-night!" "That's the idea, Twinkle-pinkle. I'd carry you off to-night if I could!" "Mommie Hat, ain't you glad?" "Effie--Effie--" "Mommie, what is it? What's the matter, darling? What?"