which seemed to her mind the only ground upon which to favor or oppose the franchise. Rodney laughed at her, and called her “Donna Quixote,” a name that Cicely liked because it was linked with tender mockery in Rodney’s eyes; she had never read “Don Quixote.” The correspondence in regard to the franchise which assailed Cicely’s desk in Mr. Wilmer Lucas’ office was couched in the code that had at first been such a stumbling block to her, but which she now read and wrote with complete fluency. It was excitingly pleasant to get inside information upon a subject that was occupying so much public attention. “I feel as biggity as Brer Rabbit to be so deep in the know!” she told Rodney. Therefore on the Monday morning after her Sunday spent at Pioneer Falls, Cicely started out for Lucas and Henderson’s office with her mind joyously attuned to anticipation, the anticipation of an interesting day superimposed upon the delicious certainty that Rodney loved her as well as she loved him, better perhaps, and that it was a matter of a few hours before she could be his promised wife. Perhaps she should have been that now, had they not met Father Morley the previous evening. The priest had intruded upon the perfect oneness of her comradeship with Rodney; he irritated Rod, and, though Father Morley impressed her as a saint, and attracted Cis herself powerfully, yet Rod said that priests “were good things to keep away from,” and if he felt so, then one could not expect him to find Father Morley’s inopportune intrusion upon them agreeable. But how beautiful had been Rodney’s manner to her, Cis thought, as, in the knowing little hotel to which he had taken her, he had ordered and pressed upon her delicious food for which she had slight appetite, yet of which she ate, coaxed into eating by the wondrous delicacies and Rodney’s ministrations to her. They had not talked upon disturbing subjects, pleasant or the reverse, but had chatted happily, in complete harmony, laughing over their own nonsense, telling each other new bits of confidences, those insignificant-significant trifles of past experience which, taken together, make up a mosaic of complete mutual knowledge. There was nothing for Cis to tell except school scrapes and triumphs, funny or piteous things which she had encountered on her short road so far through life; stories of people whom she had known, pleasures and annoyances; her reactions toward them. They were simple tales to which Rodney harkened with profound interest, deriving from them an accurate estimate of this clean-minded, gallant Cis who loved him, as he saw; whom he meant to marry, and not Gertrude Davenport with her money, realizing that in Cis he had found the woman whose existence his experience had led him to doubt.