It was scarcely possible that there should not be an air of consciousness in Louie’s manner as she went forward to meet the people with whom she expected to be allied. Fred saw it, and felt a little pang he could not define as he looked at her bright face, suffused with a flush of joy, as she greeted them. Herbert had asked if he were in love with her, and he had not answered except to say, that it was absurd, but the bit of linen hidden so carefully in his valise, for the sake of a little girl in a bib apron and white sun-bonnet, seemed to tell a different story and to prove that love is not always of slow growth. Herbert’s announcement of his engagement had taken him by surprise, and the secrecy attending it offended his sense of openness and honor. Then he knew Herbert pretty well, and had detected in him a drawing away from Louie’s father and mother, as if they were inferior to the White’s. Had he been in Herbert’s place he would not have cared who Louie’s parents were, or what they were. Louie was just as sweet as if she had never lived in White’s Row, or hemmed the napkin he had purloined. “I shouldn’t wonder if I were more than half in love,” he thought, but there was nothing in his manner to show his real feelings, as he offered her his hand and said laughingly that she did not look at all as if she had danced all night till broad daylight. “Oh, I didn’t,” Louie answered in the same strain. “You forget that I sat through one dance, and then sang that ridiculous bird-song twice, which nearly split my throat. It aches now.” “And it is about that throat I have come to talk,” Miss Percy said, entering at once upon the principal object of her call. “You have the most wonderful voice I ever heard in one so young. You must cultivate it. You ought to go abroad—to Marchesi, in Paris. Don’t you believe your father would let you go with me in the autumn? I have a great desire to see what can be made of your voice.” Louie’s eyes were like stars as she thought of Paris, but a shadow fell on her face when she remembered Herbert, who at that moment came bowling up the street on his wheel, looking flushed and not altogether pleased when he saw who Louie’s visitors were. He knew Fred was watching him, and felt annoyed at the seeming indifference with which Louie received him. She merely bowed to him and gave him her hand, and then kept talking to Miss Percy as if he were not there. She was only carrying out his instructions, he knew, but he would have liked more warmth in her manner, and was not at all pleased when Miss Percy began to speak again of Paris and Marchesi, and taking Louie abroad. “Not with a view to the stage?” he said, and he laid his hand heavily on Louie’s shoulder, as if to protect her from a threatened danger.