"King William was King James's son and from the royal race he sprung; Upon his breast he wore a star that showed the royal points of war. Go choose your east and choose your west, and choose the one that you love best. If she's not here to take your part, go choose another with all your heart. Down on this carpet you must kneel, low as the grass grows in yon field. Salute your bride and kiss her sweet, and then arise upon your feet." The sentiment was ill suited to my own at the moment, but the raw-voiced little singers appealed to my ears not unpleasantly. Again the verse came-- "If she's not here to take your part--go choose another with all your heart!" I heard wheels then, nearer than the singing,--the clumsy rumble of our big yellow 'bus. Voices were borne to me,--Clem's voice, Miss Caroline's and another not like her's, a voice firmer, yet a dusky-warm woman's voice. That was all I could think of at the time: perhaps the night suggested it; they had qualities in common. It was a woman's voice, but a determined woman's. I knew of course that Little Miss had come. But also I knew at once--this being her voice--that it would not be in my power to call her Little Miss. CHAPTER XXIII THE STRAIN OF PEAVEY It was too true that I could not call her "Little Miss," as I had lightly called her mother "Miss Caroline" at our first encounter. Of a dusky pallor was Miss Lansdale when I first beheld her under the night of her hair. As the waning light showed me her, I thought of a blossomed young sloe tree in her own far valley of the Old Dominion. Closer to her I could note only that she was dark but fair, for observations of this character became, for some reason, impracticable in her immediate presence. She greeted me kindly, as her mother's lawyer; she was cordial to me a moment, as her mother's friend; but later, when these debts of civility had been duly paid, when we had gone from the outer dusk into candle light, she favored me only with occasional glances of the mildest curiosity, in which was neither kindness nor cordiality. Not that these had given way to their opposites; they were simply not there. Not the faintest hint of unfriendliness could I detect. Miss Lansdale had merely detached herself into a magnificent void of disinterest, from the centre of which she surveyed me without prejudice in moments when her glance could not be better occupied. I have caught much the same look in the eyes of twelve bored jurymen who were, nevertheless, bound to give my remarks their impartial attention. Sometimes one may know from the look of these twelve that one's case is already as good as lost; or, at least, that an opinion has been reached which new and important testimony will be required to change.