"Nonsense," I answered her. "Laura would certainly never have desired any such thing. Our marriage will not be a thing of pomp and orange blossoms. We could just as well get married now as any other time." "No, Ranny," she replied decisively. "Now it’s my turn to be firm. I think I am right." I should honestly have preferred, in spite of the conditions that surrounded me, to have married Gertrude then and there without further delay. We are neither of us young things full of ineffable inanities on the subject of romance and I experienced a sober desire for all possible finality in the midst of the jumbled and painful confusion into which Fate had seen fit to cast me. But Gertrude was obdurate. Just as she was about to go there was a gentle tap on the door. Gertrude, whose hand was already on the knob, opened it. It was the girl Alicia. With a downward quizzical glance Gertrude fixed the girl so that for a moment she stood fascinated, unable to detach her eyes from Gertrude’s. She turned them in my direction finally and they were troubled and imploring. "Please, Mr. Byrd," she said, "the children want to go for a walk now, instead of lessons. The sun is out. Can I take them?" "Yes, yes," I said hastily. "By all means." "Wait a minute," commanded Gertrude, smiling mechanically. "What is your name, child?" "Alicia, ma’am." "Alicia what?" "Alicia Palmer," and the child’s voice was tremulous with trepidation. "And do you give the children lessons?" "Yes, ma’am," she answered, lowering her eyes as though a crime had found her out. "And how old are you?" asked Gertrude not unkindly. "Going on fourteen, ma’am." The girl looked up at once, responsive to the gentler tone. But wishing to relieve her of the interrogatory, I lamely put in a word urging that she take the children out at once before the sun had disappeared. The girl glided away like a shadow. "Why, she’s quite attractive—the little thing," murmured Gertrude. "You’ll have quite a menagerie." Then, laughingly turning to me, she cried, "Oh, Ranny, Efficiency ought to be your middle name." "Perhaps I’d better adopt it?" I murmured. "Do," said Gertrude. "Well, so long, old boy, I must be running." And in her haste she even forgot to let me kiss her good-by. So after all the alderman at the City Hall was not to sing his song over us yet. For no reason that I can help I seem to be in disgrace with fortune, Gertrude and aldermen’s eyes. A nameless melancholy, a kind of humorous sadness, has taken possession of me.