“Tell her I wait my time,” he answered, and began to talk lightly of other things. Virginia followed his lead with her old shy merriment. Her marriage had changed her but little, though she had grown a trifle stately, he thought, and her coquetry had dropped from her like a veil. As she stood there in her delicate lace cap and soft gray silk, the likeness to her mother was very marked, and looking into the future, Dan seemed to see her beauty ripen and expand with her growing womanhood. How many of her race had there been, he wondered, shaped after the same pure and formal plan. “And it is all just the same,” he said, his eyes delighting in her beauty. “There is no change--don't tell me there is any change, for I'll not believe it. You bring it all back to me,--the lawn and the lilacs and the white pillars, and Miss Lydia's garden, with the rose leaves in the paths. Why are there always rose leaves in Miss Lydia's paths, Virginia?” Virginia shook her head, puzzled by his whimsical tone. “Because there are so many roses,” she answered seriously. “No, you're wrong, there's another reason, but I shan't tell you.” “My boxes are filled with rose leaves now,” said Virginia. “Betty gathered them for me.” The smile leaped to his eyes. “Oh, but it makes me homesick,” he returned lightly. “If I tell you a secret, don't betray me, Virginia--I am downright homesick for Betty.” Virginia patted his hand. “So am I,” she confessed, “and so is Mammy Riah--she's with me now, you know--and she says that I might have been married without Jack, but never without Betty. Betty made my dress and iced my cake and pinned on my veil.” “Ah, is that so?” exclaimed Dan, absent-mindedly. He was thinking of Betty, and he could almost see her hands as she pinned on the wedding veil--those small white hands with the strong fingers that had closed about his own. “When you get your furlough you must go home, Dan,” Virginia was saying; “the Major is very feeble and--and he quarrels with almost everyone.” “My furlough,” repeated Dan, with a laugh. “Why, the war may end to-morrow and then we'll all go home together and kill the fatted calf among us. Yes, I'd like to see the old man again before I die.” “I pray every night that the war may end tomorrow,” said Virginia, “but it never does.” Then she turned eagerly to the Governor, who was coming toward them under the leafless trees along the street. “Here's Dan, papa, do make him come in and be good.” The Governor, holding himself erect in his trim gray uniform, insisted, with his hand upon Dan's shoulder, that Virginia should be obeyed; and the younger man, yielding easily, followed him through the iron gate and into the yellow house.