I don't believe she's in love with me. It was only that she couldn't bear to have me humiliated, and was willing to make a sacrifice to save me pain. But I do believe I could make her love me if I tried. The kind angel as good as admitted the cause of her illness by making a quick recovery and going in with Captain Winston while I followed with his wife. Molly, by the way, almost confessed she'd suspected that Pat was anxious for my welfare, and had come out to relieve the girl's mind. Do you wonder at the state of mine? I'm bound to add that my rescue didn't seem to restore her spirits permanently. She looked rather "wan," as Molly said, all the rest of the evening; or it may have been the effect of a green dress she wore. Certainly she was somewhat _piano_ in manner, too; and despite her pal's slap at Caspian, the princess didn't treat him as if he were the dragon of the opera. On the contrary, she sat out several dances with him. I bear her no grudge, though! She hadn't the air of enjoying his society. We were to have started for Kidd's Pines the morning after the dance at Piping Rock, but a Mrs. Sam de Silverley (who said she knew you) was moved by curiosity to want me introduced to her. She "pined to see the inside of the Stanislaws house," first hinted and then pleaded to do so, and in return invited the whole of our crowd to a garden party at her place. Some Russian dancers were to "entertain," and the Goodriches--who are seeing life with all their souls--yearned to go. So did our bride and bridegroom, who want their money's worth of honeymoon; therefore it was arranged that we stay over, and drive home in a moonlight procession. I am not built for bun worries, be they out of doors or in, and declined on the plea of important work. Besides, I saw by the look in Patsey's eyes that she also intended to refuse. I hoped that through some remarkable coincidence we might meet in the garden "at home," as we had the day before, but Caspian caught the coincidence this time, so I sulked in the house with man's most faithful dumb companion, a pipe. Caspian didn't stay with my little lady for long, so I hope she refused him and got it over with. Anyhow, she was in a delicious mood all the way to Kidd's Pines, as you may have assumed from the tone and indeed the very existence of this letter. We talked of impersonal things, never of ourselves and seldom of each other, and she was not as gay as when we began the trip, yet--never had she been so dear.