“Overslept myself,” said Fritz. “I say, will you take a note from me to ‘Prices’?” To which Denis consenting, he wrote on a blank leaf of the huge pocketbook in which he always carried the “pass” Mr. Randolph had procured for him,— “DEAR MR. CLARE,—I’m off for New York. Gretchen has gone on the 5 A.M. You promised to help me, so make it all right with the Emperor and Miss Sally, and don’t let the pastor make a row. I’ll bring her back all right in a day or two. Blame it all on me. “Truly yrs, “FRITZ R.” “P. S. I don’t want her talked about: my wife, you know.” CHAPTER IX. “THE ETYMOLOGY OF GRACE.” “It is rather a confused note,” said Mr. Clare, “and I fear I can’t show it to any one, as it was intended for my eye alone; but I gather from it that Fritz expects to be married in New York, and to return in a day or two.” “The letter she left on her bureau,” said the pastor, whose eyes were red with weeping, “said much the same, except that she spoke not of so soon returning. I doubted it not to be Fritz with whom she had fled, though she spoke of riches and jewels, and of taking care of her old father. But ach! that a child of mine should so act!” “Well, young folks will be young folks,” observed the Emperor, who sat looking intensely amused, on the side of the table; “and I suppose they just got tired of waiting.” “It was that there pass to New York that was burning a hole in Fritz’s pocketbook,” said Miss Sally sagely, “that’s what it was. Well, it’s a foolish business altogether, and I thought better of both of them, but I guess we’ll have to make the best of it.” “Laugh it off,” advised Father McClosky. “Av coorse, ’twas foolish, as ye say, Miss Sally; but maybe after all ’twas motives of economy injeuced ‘em. Sure, New York’s a mighty aisy place to get married in, annyway; no fuss about a license or that. The wurrust of it is, a felly never knows whin he _ain’t_ married. I never was there but wance, and thin I shook in me shoes till I was safe out again; but whin a man _wants_ to be married”—he paused expressively. The plan thus outlined being adopted, it came to pass that when Mr. and Mrs. Fritz Rolf returned to Micklegard, as they did in the course of a week, they were greeted with a roar of good-natured ridicule, but found their escapade considered otherwise a matter of slight importance.