"I don't know--I'll have to think about it," he answered her, weakly capitulating, but still on guard. "If I choose one for to-day, when will you wear the other? Soon?" he bargained for his forbearance. "Whenever you want me to if you'd like to see it," she answered with what he ought to have known was dangerous meekness. "What are you going to wear?" she asked, putting the direct question with disarming boldness. "Blue serge Sunday-go-to-meetings," he answered carelessly, as if it were a matter to be dismissed with the statement. "Let's see--say them over again--white dress, pink parasol, rose hat, how did they go?" "Once, not long ago, I was in your room with Mrs. Mayberry hunting for the kittens the yellow cat had hidden in the house, and I caught a glimpse of a most beautiful frock coat--it made me feel partyfied then, and I thought of the rose gown I have never worn and--and--" she paused to let that much sink in well. "I thought I would ask you," she ended in a pensive tone, as she kept her eyes fixed on the rose determinedly. "You don't have to ask me things--just tell me!" he answered with an exquisite hint of something in his voice which he quickly controlled. "The frock coat let it be--and shall we say the rose gown? Then the high gods protect Providence when it beholds!" he added with a laugh. "Oh, will you really?" she asked, overwhelmed with the ease with which the battle had been won. "I will," he answered, "only don't let Mother tease me, please!" At which pathetically ingenuous demand the conquering singer lady tossed him the rose and laughed long and merrily. "You and your Mother are perfect--" she was observing with delighted dimples, when Mother Mayberry herself stood in the doorway with well-concealed eagerness as to the outcome of the mission, in her face. "Well," she observed with a laugh, "I'm glad to see somebody that has time to stand-around, set-around, passing the news of the day. Did you all know that Bettie Pratt were a-going to get married in about two hours and a half?" "We did," answered her son as he drew her a chair close to that of Miss Wingate. "We were just discussing in what garb we could best grace the occasion. Did you succeed in getting Mrs. Tutt to change her mind about honoring the festivities?" "Oh, yes, she just wanted to be persuaded some. It's a mighty dried-up mind that can't leaf out in a change onct in a while, and it's mostly men folks that take a notion, then petrify to stone in it. But you all oughter see what is a-going on down the Road." "What?" they both demanded of her at the same second.