“Oh, a great deal better,” cried Margaret, fervently. “Come early; be sure you come early, Mr. Glen. I will be ready. I will be waiting. I will let you see the best place for the view. And perhaps you would like to see the house? And then I will go with you, and stand by you, and hold your colors and your pencils, and watch the way you do it. Oh!” cried Margaret, putting her hands together, and breathing forth an earnest invocation of all the good spirits of the elements. “Oh, that it may only be a fine day!” This very prayer brought home to them both the too plain suggestion conveyed by these gathering clouds, that it might not be a fine day, and chilled their very souls within them. If it should rain! “I think,” said Rob, but timidly, “that it is looking better. The sky is cloudy here, but it’s clear in the quarter where the wind is, and a north wind is seldom rainy. I think it will be a fine day.” “Do you think so, Mr. Glen?” Margaret looked up at him very wistfully, and then at the sky. Then she cleared up all at once, though the sky did not. “Any way,” she said, “you will come? If it’s wet, I could let you see the house. I think you would like to see the house. And bring a great many pictures and sketch-books to let papa see. Even if it is wet, it will be not so very bad,” said Margaret, throwing a smile suddenly upon him like a light from a lantern. But then she recollected herself, and blushed wildly and grew serious--for he was a man and a stranger. Was he a stranger? No, she said to herself--and not even a gentleman, only Robert Glen. What fury would have been in poor Rob’s heart had he known this last consoling sentiment which kept Margaret from feeling herself overbold. But she did not mean all the arrogance and impertinence that appeared in the thought. Not all of it, nor half of it. She meant no impertinence at all. She parted with him where the by-way came out upon the road, and went along the flowery hedge-row very demurely, thinking very kindly of Rob Glen. Margaret had not known before what it was to have a companion of her own age. Youth loves youth, all the more if youth has little experience of anything but age. Rob was a great deal more amusing (to Margaret) than Bell. This, perhaps, was a mistake, for Rob was not nearly so original as Bell was, nor so well worth knowing. But Margaret did not know that Bell was original. She knew all her stories, and was not too anxious to call forth that homely philosophy which so often (or so the girl thought) was subtly adapted for her own reproof and discouragement. Rob was a novelty to Margaret, even more than she was to him. The prospect of his visit made her feel that even a wet day would be endurable. He amused her more than any one had ever done before. And then she comforted herself that she could not be thought forward, or too bold, because, after all, he was not a gentleman or a stranger, but only Rob Glen!