"But I thought there was to be no engagement?" The judge looked up, as if there had been betrayal. But Lavinia only smiled. The judge looked at her a moment, then released her hand. "I wouldn't wear it where any one could see it," he said. The summer stretched itself long into September; and then came the still days of fall, moving slowly by in majestic procession. With the first cool air, a new restless energy awoke in Marley. All the summer he had neglected his studies; but now a change was working in him as wonderful as that which autumn was working in the world. He looked back at that happy, self-sufficient summer, and, for an instant, he had a wild, impotent desire to detain it, to hold it, to keep things just as they were; but the summer was gone, the winter at hand, and he felt all at once the impact of practical life. He faced the future, and for an instant he recoiled. Lavinia was standing looking up at him. She laid her hand on his shoulder. "What is it, Glenn?" "I was just thinking," he said, "that I have a great assurance in asking you to marry me." "What do you mean?" "Why, dear, just this: I can't get a practice in Macochee; I might as well look it in the face now as any time. I have known it all along, but I've kept it from you, and I've tried to keep it from myself. There's no place here for me; everybody says so, your father, Wade Powell, everybody. There's no chance for a young man in the law in these small towns. I've tried to make myself think otherwise. I've tried to make myself believe that after I'd been admitted I could settle down here and get a practice and we could have a little home of our own--but--" "Can't we?" Lavinia whispered the words, as if she were afraid utterance would confirm the fear they imported. "Well--that's what they all say," Marley insisted. "But papa's always talking that way," Lavinia protested. "I suppose all old men do. They forget that they were ever young, and I don't see what right they have to destroy your faith, your confidence, or the confidence of any young man!" Lavinia blazed out these words indignantly. It was consoling to Marley to hear them, he liked her passionate partizanship in his cause. He longed for her to go on, and he waited, anxious to be reassured in spite of himself. He could see her face dimly in the starlight, and feel her figure rigid with protest beside him. "It's simply wicked in them," she said presently. "I don't care what they say. We can and we will!" "I like to have you put it that way, dear," said Marley. "I like to have you say 'we'!" She drew more closely to him. "And you think we can?" he said presently. "I know it." "And have a little home, here, in one of these quiet streets, with the shade, and the happiness--" "Yes!" "And it wouldn't matter much if we were poor?" "No!" "Just at first, you know. I'd work hard, and we could be so happy, so happy, just we two, together!" "Yes, yes," she whispered.