"Suppose, then," said Ralph, "that we take a little turn in the moonlight. Then we need not trouble ourselves to lower our voices." "That will be very well," said Dora, "but I am afraid she may take cold, although the night air is so soft. I think I saw a lap robe on a table in the hall; I will spread that over her." Ralph whispered that he would get the robe, but motioning him back, and having tiptoed into the hall and back again, Dora laid the light covering over the sleeping girl so gently that the regular breathing was not in the least interrupted. Then they both went quietly down the steps, and out upon the lawn. "She is such a dear girl," said Dora, as they slowly moved away, "and although we only met to-day, I am really growing very fond of her, and I like her the better because there is still so much of the child left in her. Do not you like her the better for that, Mr. Haverley?" Ralph did agree most heartily, and it made him happy to agree on any subject with a girl who was even more beautiful by moonlight than by day; who was so kind, and tended to his sister, and whose generous disposition could overlook little breaches of etiquette when there was reason to do so. As they walked backward and forward, not very far away from the piazza, and sometimes stopping to admire bits of the silver-tinted landscape, Dora, with most interesting deftness, gave Ralph further opportunity of knowing her. With his sister as a suggesting subject, she talked about herself; she told him how she, too, had lost her parents early in life, and had been obliged to be a very independent girl, for her stepmother, although just as good as she could be, was not a person on whom she could rely very much. As for her brother, the dearest man on earth, she had always felt that she was more capable of taking care of him, at least in all matters in home life, than he of her. "But I have been very happy," she went on to say, "for I am so fond of country life, and everything that belongs to it, that the more I have to do with it, the better I like it, and I really begrudge the time that I spend in the city. You do not know with what pleasure I look forward to helping Miriam get breakfast to-morrow morning. I consider it a positive lark. By the way, Mr. Haverley, do you like rolled omelets?" Ralph declared that he liked everything that was good, and had no doubt that rolled omelets were delicious. "Then I shall make some," said Dora, "for I know how to do it. And I think you said, Mr. Haverley, that the coffee to-night was too strong." "A little so, perhaps," said Ralph, "but it was excellent." "Oh, it shall be better in the morning. I am sure it will be well for one of us to do one thing, and the other another. I will make the coffee."