“I HAVE appealed to you, sir,” said Raoul, when we had abandoned the still quiet camp for the solitude of the forest, “to demand that which every gentleman has the right to ask of every other.” I feared the man had some notion of a duel, and his next words did not tend to relieve me. “I have long loved Miss Bruce.” I must have appeared disquieted, for he hastened to add, “Miss May Bruce, I mean. But until yesterday I did not know my love was returned. We have now resolved on being married.” I expressed my congratulations, but intimated that I did not yet see how my aid was necessary. “We have resolved to make our bridal journey to the White Sulphur Springs, in Virginia. We shall be married upon arrival there, and I should esteem it a favor initial of a life-long friendship if you, sir, would consent to be best man. Moreover, your escort may prove necessary to Miss Jeanie to return.” My escort! to Miss Jeanie! I was to travel with her four hundred miles--meantime her sister philandering with this young man--perhaps make a visit at a fashionable watering-place--give away her sister in matrimony--and then make the principal bridesmaid companion of my journey home! And this young Huguenot, _pour sauver la situation_, called me her escort. I looked at Raoul; his attitude was impassive and his manner still courteous; but evidently he thought there was something unchivalric even in my hesitation. “I--has Miss Jeanie Bruce,” I hazarded, “yet been told of your plans?” “Of course--and she approves them. She can hardly invite you herself to join her party; it might look forward, as you and she, necessarily, will be left much to yourselves.” Absent-mindedly I twirled the ring on my finger, still there, that she had given me. Evidently, as a gentleman, in the eyes of him, of her, and of her sister, there was nothing else for me to do. “I must see Miss Bruce herself,” I gasped. “Certainly,” said Raoul. “I had reckoned, sir, that such would be your course. I will meet you in front of the commissary’s tent at three. We start at four.” He stalked off, and left me under the live-oak tree. It was two o’clock. I felt that I must see Miss Jeanie at once. Nothing could exceed the good-breeding of her greeting; but she evidently expected me to go. The calm of her gentle voice told me so. I found the two beautiful young girls in afternoon toilette of white muslin, half reclining under their open tent, fanning themselves. I think I would not have been so much in doubt had not Jeanie been so very pretty. Then, how hazard, in the presence of her sister, and of her own soft eyes, the fear that she might be committing an impropriety?