"_Who is Sylvia, what is she? That all her swains commend her. Holy, fair and wise is she; The heavens grace did lend her, That adored she might be._" "And now that's finished," said Teddie, "let's have Sedley Field Song." "You asked me to sing 'Who is Sylvia,'" retorted John. "I know, but ours is better." "All right then, here you are,"--and once more John's hands pressed down the black and white keys while his voice went soaring into "Field Song." "_Summer days, winter days, when a fellow's young And friends are many and pains are few, When the ball going over filled every fellow's lung With cheers for--_" Yes, those were beautiful nights in the lamp-lit vicarage drawing-room. Their memories sank deep into the heart of a happy impressionable boy. But one more impression. Enter, on Thursday night, two days before the termination of their visit, Veronica, aged seventeen and all the Spring sweetness thereof. It was thoughtful of Mrs. Marsh to ask a lonely girl from a neighbouring manor house, but she could not have seen the effect on John. He first saw her in the hall. He had just come down the stairs, immaculate and well-groomed, with shining hair and the rose-red of health in his face. He heard a mingling of voices--Mrs. Marsh's and another--that other! His heart stopped. It was like the trill of a bird. Then he saw a flimsy cloak fall away, revealing a thin, elfin girl, with gleaming shoulders and a dress swan-like in the dim hall light. She turned and he could see her face--an oval, petite face with a little whimsical mouth which might be just going to laugh or cry, and the small head tumbling with curls, short and bobbed, and shaking as she turned. It was a vision and the youth on the stairs paused--would she vanish into the darkness of the doorway again, or-- "Here's John," said Mrs. Marsh coming forward. "Veronica, this is John Dean, Teddie's friend." "How d' you do," she said to John, and half held out her hand, but John, embarrassed, withheld his, and then bowed stiffly. Mrs. Marsh noticed his gaucherie, and guessed the cause.