"I guess, Miss," said Maria in confusion, "I guess it's from a friend of mine." Lola looked after her, as she hurried out of the room, the precious letter clutched tightly in her hand. "Poor girl! That is from her sweetheart, the one she calls Mr. Barnes, and she can't read it." "I thought you were to teach her," remarked her father, as he helped himself to a second piece of toast. "I am trying my best," answered Lola, "but she never had a chance before, that's what makes it so hard for her now." "She has done wonders since you found her, my dear girl. She has caught the spirit of this great New York, and she is growing very fast." "Hello!" he exclaimed, as he opened the first of his letters. "From Paul Crossett." Lola looked up, surprised and pleased, as her father hastily read the brief note, and continued. "He is here, at last! Here in New York! And he is coming up this morning." "That's fine!" exclaimed Lola, her face reflecting her father's pleasure. "I have heard so much about him all my life, and now I am really going to see him." "I, myself," said the Doctor, "have only seen him once in ten years, only twice in twenty. He is a great man now, rich and famous, but he was a scamp when I first knew him." He laughed softly as his mind travelled back to the time when he and this successful French physician were boys together at the University. "How was it?" inquired Lola, "that a Frenchman was your chum at Heidelberg?" "He was," her father replied, "even as a boy, a cynic, a philosopher, and he amused me. He had a big mind, and a big heart, and I loved him." As he spoke he opened the second letter, and after a moment's reading looked up at Lola, his face reflecting an almost comic dismay. "Listen, Lola! 'My dear Doctor,'" he read slowly, his voice betraying his surprise and growing distress, "'I am going to call upon you to-morrow, and ask you to do me a great honor. I love your daughter----'" he stopped helplessly, almost like a child, afraid to continue. Lola rose from the table, blushing furiously, but with a happy light underlying the guilty look in her eyes. "Father!" He looked at her for a moment, and gradually his look softened and the surprise gave way to a humorous tenderness. "Let's tear it up," he suggested, holding the unwelcome paper out before him. "I think that would be the best way out of this." "Oh, no, father!" exclaimed Lola, catching his hand anxiously; "do go on, it's very interesting." "Oh," said the Doctor drily, "then we will proceed. 'I love your daughter, and I want to ask you to let her become my wife.'" "And to think," said Lola, as he paused, "and to think that I didn't know his handwriting." "So! So you know who had the impudence to write this," assumed her father. "Well," replied Lola rather timidly, "I have my suspicions." "Oh, this love business," groaned the Doctor in great disgust; "just as I have everything fixed, this must come! It is Mr. Fenway, I suppose?"