Magnus, meanwhile, with quite as much of the "boy" as the "grand" about him, despite his inches, tiptoed off along passages and through doorways that he knew by heart, following the hum of voices. So presently came out into the small summer kitchen, where a pleasant smell of good cookery steamed and puffed and whiffed from various vessels within and upon the stove. Dishes stood ready on the table, with white-covered pans of rolls just waiting to be baked, but save the old cat, winking and blinking by the oven door, there was nobody in charge. Magnus gave her a toss up in the air for old times' sake, peeped cautiously out at the broad back steps, then let himself easily down through the open window and came round the other way upon the scene of the sweet chatter that was going on. The three girls were on the steps, Rose and Violet hulling strawberries, while Cherry in a wide check apron, sat on the lowest step of all with a basket of lettuce at her side, picking over the fresh green leaves, and dropping them into a pan of cold water. A thick clump of lilac bushes served as a screen. "Do you know," Rose was saying, "I cannot believe it, yet. I think I cried for joy a little bit, when I waked up in the night and remembered that Magnus was really here." "And doesn't he look well?" said Violet; "and isn't he a beauty?" "Do not tell him that," Cherry answered with discretion. She would have given a ready enough answer a week ago, but somehow, with the continent no more between them, the young damsel had grown wary. "I'm afraid everybody else will tell him," said Rose. "But he is not spoiled a bit _yet_. Don't you think so?" "Not a bit." It was a very mild way of giving her estimate, and Cherry scolded herself that she could not answer freely, as she had always done; called herself to account for the shyness which had sprung into life with, indeed, the very first coming of that photograph. "I am such a goose!" poor Cherry thought, bending down low over the lettuce basket. "What shall I do to myself? If only he had not acted so last night!" And just here, by way of composing matters, two hands came softly round her head, and were laid lightly and respectfully upon her eyes. It was one of his old teasing ways with her. Cherry's start passed almost into a tremor. She put up her hands to remove the obstruction, and they were taken and held fast; and what more Magnus might have dared had there been no witnesses, will never be known. Cherry lifted her face, trying to speak sternly. "Magnus," she said, "you have not improved one bit. I thought West Point was to make a man of you--or a better man--or something." "It has made 'something' of me," he retorted, gazing down at her. "Give you three guesses." "Too much else to do. Set that pan of lettuce on the table, please. Don't you see how busy I am?" And Cherry drew towards her a basket of green peas and began to shell with all her might.