Dodge, carefully removing the papers to the floor, seated himself on the visitor's chair, and let his eyes rest with a curious, half-triumphant look upon Gwendolen's downcast face. This young man, unlike others to whom she had chosen to show favor, had not hastened to throw himself at her feet, pleading to be sat upon, trod upon, built upon, anything but the one obvious suggestion that he rise and walk away. He had never tried to take her hand; never once said that he loved her, though the girl until this moment had felt certain of it. Sometimes she had tried to flatter him into the declaration; again she would pique and goad him. The result had been the same. Dodge followed her everywhere, paid her all possible attentions, and said everything but the one thing she had determined to hear. With an instinctive coquette, the desire is not so much to overcome her quarry, as to feel that there is no quarry she cannot overcome. But even from the seductive moonlit decks of the steamship Dodge had escaped, uncommitted. The situation was both piquant and exciting. "Well, Dodge," said the ambassador, at length. "I am willing to take your suggestion. Is the carriage ready, Gwen?" "It's been at your door for hours." "I'll let you go, since you seem to feel so set on it. But be careful of what you say or do, and don't promise anything. Give little Snowflake my love, and tell her I miss her about the house." Gwendolen, without a word of thanks, walked toward the door. "Now, Dodge, remember," warned her father, in a semi-whisper. "If Mr. Dodge is being sent along as a sort of diplomatic nurse, or a keeper to an idiot, I won't have him," flashed the girl. "Nonsense, child!" said her father. "You'd better run along in a hurry before I change my mind. I don't know but as I'm weak--" Without waiting for more, the girl literally ran from the room. Clerks and visitors in the outside offices looked up in wonder. That dry sob in her throat had stirred again. Even her dad, on this horrid day, was cross. Outside the sun had begun to shine brilliantly. The high winds, those scourges of the Tokio winter, were, for the time, at rest. The people in the streets appeared contented and happy enough, trudging along on wooden clogs, or trotting with noiseless, straw-sandalled feet between the shafts of vehicles. The small boys wore miniature flags in their caps. When again she felt mistress of her voice, she said, with an attempt at her usual gay levity, "Now, Mr. Dodge, I intend to know what all that mysterious interchange of glances in the office was supposed to convey." Dodge seemed to think. "I should fancy you'd know by instinct," he answered. "Japan and Russia are at war. America is neutral." "Yes," challenged Gwendolen, "and the earth goes around the sun, and the moon around the earth. But what is that to Yuki and to me?"