CHAPTER XXVII THE STARS AGAIN Don went to the nearest telephone and rang up Frances. "Your father lost his temper," he explained. "He ordered me not to call again; so will you please to meet me on the corner right away?" "I've just seen him," she answered. "Oh, Don, it was awful!" "It is the best thing that could have happened," he said. "We have to meet in the park now. It's the only place left." "Don, dear, he told me not to meet you anywhere again. He--he was quite savage about it." "He had no right to tell you that," Don answered. "Anyhow, I must see you. We'll talk it over under the stars." "But, Don--" "Please to hurry," he said. She slipped a scarf over her hair and a cape over her shoulders, and walked to the corner, looking about fearfully. He gripped her arm and led her confidently away from the house and toward the park. The sky was clear, and just beyond the Big Dipper he saw shining steadily the star he had given Sally Winthrop. He smiled. It was as if she reassured him. "What did you say to him, Don?" she panted. "I told him I wished to marry you to-morrow," he answered. "And he--" "He said I shouldn't. He said he could give you more with his ten thousand than I could give you with my twelve hundred. I told him I could give you more with my twelve hundred than he could with his ten thousand." "I've never seen him so angry," she trembled. "I'd never before seen him angry at all," he admitted. "But, after all, that isn't important, is it? The important thing is whether or not he's right. That's what you and I must decide for ourselves." She did not quite understand. She thought her father had already decided this question. However, she said nothing. In something of a daze, she allowed herself to be led on toward the park--at night a big, shadowy region with a star-pricked sky overhead. Like one led in a dream she went, her thoughts quite confused, but with the firm grip of his hand upon her arm steadying her. He did not speak again until the paved street and the stone buildings were behind them--until they were among the trees and low bushes and gravel paths. He led her to a bench. "See those stars?" he asked, pointing. "Yes, Don." "I want you to keep looking at them while I'm talking to you," he said. Just beyond the Big Dipper he saw the star he had given Sally Winthrop. It smiled reassuringly at him. "What I've learned this summer," he said, "is that, after all, the clear sky and those stars are as much a part of New York as the streets and high buildings below them. And when you live up there a little while you forget about the twelve hundred or the ten thousand. Those details don't count up there. Do you see that?" "Yes, Don." "The trouble with your father, and the trouble with you, and the trouble with me, until a little while ago, is that we didn't get out here in the park enough where the stars can be seen. I'm pretty sure, if I'd been sitting here with your father, he'd have felt different."