Ella was laughing with him in spite of herself. Indeed the more she tried to be grave and severe the more impossible it became. "Mr. Houghton," she managed to say at last, "will you do me a favor?" "Scores of them." "Then stop making me laugh. I don't wish to laugh." His face instantly assumed such portentous and awful gravity that he set her off again to such a degree that the dowagers in the other room looked at her rebukingly. It was bad enough, they thought, that she should talk to old Houghton's son at all, but to show such unbecoming levity-well, it was not what they would "expect of a Bodine." Ella saw their disapproval, and felt she was losing her self-control. The warnings she had received against her companion embarrassed her, and banished the power to be her natural self. "Please don't," she gasped, "or I shall go at once. I asked a favor." "Pardon me, Miss Bodine," he now said in a tone and manner which quieted her nerves at once. "I have blundered again, but I was so happy to think that I had met you here. I am not wholly a rattle-brain. What would you like to talk about?" and he looked so kindly and eager to please her that she cast down her eyes and contracted her brow in deepest perplexity. "Truly, Mr. Houghton, I should be on my way homeward, and you have so hedged me in that I cannot escape." "Is running away from me escaping?" "I don't like that phrase 'running away.'" "Yet that is what you propose to do." "Oh, no, I shall take my departure in a very composed and dignified manner." His face had the expression of almost boyish distress. "You find on further thought that you cannot forgive me?" he asked sadly. "Did I not say that was all explained and settled? Southern girls are not fickle or false to their word." And she managed to assume an aspect of great dignity. "If I do not shake him off in the next few minutes I'm lost," she thought. "I've offended you again," he said anxiously. She took refuge in silence. "Miss Bodine, I ask your pardon. You know I can't do more than that, or if I can, tell me what. I wish to please you very much." The girl was at her wit's end, for his ingenuous expression emphasized the truth of his words. "There is no reason why you should please me," she began coolly, and then knew not how to proceed. "Let us be frank with each other," he resumed earnestly. "We are too young yet to indulge in society lies. When a man apologizes at the North he is forgiven. I have been told that Southerners are a generous, warm-hearted people. In their cool treatment of me they counteract the climate. Are you, too, going to ostracize me?" "I fear I shall have to," she replied faintly. "Of your own free will?" "No, indeed." His heart gave a great throb of joy, but he had the sense to conceal his gladness. He only said quietly, "Well, I'm glad that you at least do not detest me." "Why should I detest you, Mr. Houghton?"