"Well, anyway," I found myself reassuring her quickly, "even as it is, you have three weeks to think it over—to back out in. Three weeks is a good long time, Gertrude. Much can happen in three weeks." On the table before me lay a new life of Leonardo da Vinci, just arrived from Paris that day. My fingers itched to open it and turn the pages. But that would have been rude, so I forebore. "I am not like that," Gertrude murmured reflectively, "and you know it, Ranny." "Of course not," I guiltily assented. "I know," she tapped my cheek with a playful finger—Gertrude can be very charming if she thinks of it—"I know perfectly what I want to do. And when I make up my mind to do a thing I stick to it." And so she does, the clever girl! "I wish I were like you," I muttered. "I am a sort of drifter, I’m afraid." "That’s why you need a manager," laughed Gertrude. "Wait till you’ve got me. Then you won’t be just running after books and telling yourself what you’re going to do some day. You’ll be doing, publishing, lecturing; you’ll be known—famous." "Oh my heavens!" I cried out in a terror, throwing up a defensive hand. "I think I’ll run away." "Too late," she smiled, with a cool archness. When Gertrude smiles she is exceedingly handsome. "I’ve ordered my trousseau. You wouldn’t leave me waiting at the City Hall, would you?" "I might," I answered, smiling back at her. "If there should happen to be a book auction that morning. And it’s only a subway fare back to your flat." "Now, this is the program," she announced, assuming her magisterial tone, which instantaneously reduces me to a spineless worm before her. "You will come to my flat on the twenty-fourth at ten o’clock. Then we shall drive down in a taxi to the City Hall and get the license—or whatever they call it—" "Lucky you’ll be there," I could not help murmuring. "I should probably get a dog license or a motor-car license instead of the correct one—" "Then," went on Gertrude, very properly ignoring me, "we can have the alderman of the day sing the necessary song." "He may want to sing an encore—or kiss the bride," I warned her. "He won’t want to kiss me when I look at him," answered Gertrude imperturbably. Nor will he! "Then," she added, "we can stop here at your place and pick up your hand luggage, and mine on the way to the Grand Central Station. You can send your trunk the day before and I’ll send mine. No time lost, you see, no waste, no foolishness." "Perfect efficiency, in short—" "Yes," said Gertrude, "you’ll probably forget some important detail in the arrangement, but there’s time enough to drill you into it the next three weeks." "Forget," I repeated, somewhat dazedly, I admit. "What is there to forget—except possibly my name, age or color?"