"H'm," agreed King. "A Daniel come to judgment. Maud likes you very much," he added. "She loves me, thank you," flashed Linda, against his tepid speech. "Then it runs in the family. I've told her how I felt toward you myself." "And told her all my faults, I suppose." The girl bit her lip. "Oh, I knew she could see those. Maud is very penetrating." Fire and dew flashed at him again. "Linda," he added in a different tone, "Whitcomb can't be much longer. Do you know I'm asking you to marry me?" An inarticulate sound from his companion, and continued drumming on the window pane. "I came to your father's employ ten years ago. I climbed the ladder slowly, but just three years and eight months ago I reached the rung from which I could see you." A pause. "You've haunted me ever since." "Unintentional, I assure you." But Linda, her cheeks burning, could not look around again. In her tumult of hurt pride and indignation there penetrated a strain of triumph. "Certainly," returned King; "you had other things to attend to, and so had I. You've attended to them with vast credit, and your father will tell you that I'm not so bad. Now a new chapter begins. Probably no one will ever love you as comprehendingly as I do." "I shouldn't think of marrying any one who didn't consider me perfect," announced Linda clearly. "Remember the chromo that goes with me--Mrs. Porter. Maud would be your cousin." King dangled his eyeglasses as he made the suggestion, and regarded a short curl of hair that had dropped against his companion's white neck. Linda was silent for a moment. "I suppose you'll poison her mind against me now," she said. "No. You've poured hot tea and cold water on my budding hopes, but I'm strictly honorable; and besides, I'm going to remember that both douches are good for plants. Ask your father if I know how to hang on to a proposition." Silence. Linda's strong heart beat against her ribs as the man came a step nearer to her. "Don't you touch me!" she exclaimed. "I wasn't thinking of touching you, Linda. I just wanted to fix your hair. Something has fallen down here; just wait, I see a hairpin." The girl preserved her pose under the caressing hands for a second, but he fumbled the soft lock, and she suspected him. "That will do," she said, jerking her head away. "Oh, well, I fixed it. You might thank me, going out as you are." "I should think Fred had fallen dead!" she exclaimed. "Yes; Maud prescribes Maine for me. She knows the lay of the land pretty well up there. She says she has known it for thirty years. I think that's an exaggeration, don't you?" "I don't know how old she is, and I don't care; I only know that it must have nearly killed her husband to die and leave her." King rocked back and forth on his toes. "I've heard that it did, entirely," he responded.