In her keen disappointment she was quite unconscious how much pathetic emphasis she laid upon "to-day." "To-morrow, then?" said Walter, instantly. "Could you not slip away from that terrible Dollie to-morrow?" She looked at him, her eyes shining, her lips trembling with pleasure. "Yes, if you went at noon," she said; "if later--no." "Why not later?" asked Violet, curiously. "Because I must help with the milking then," she answered, simply. "We will go at noon, then," said Walter at once. "We will call for you punctually, and you must be ready." "Young ladies are never ready when called for," said Ronald Valchester, with his slight smile. "I will prove the exception to the rule," Jaquelina answered, brightly, while Violet said to herself in wonder: "_What_ in the world will she wear? I _do_ wonder why mamma insists upon having us patronize Jaquelina Meredith. She is not in our set, and she hasn't a decent thing to wear! It is strange she doesn't have the good sense to understand it herself and decline our invitations." Violet said the same to herself the next day when she went upon the river. Violet had on a lovely boating-suit of blue serge, and a leghorn sailor hat set coquettishly on her golden locks. Jaquelina wore her simple pink-dotted calico dress, with a white ruffled apron tied about the slim, round waist, "for all the world," as Miss Violet said to herself, pityingly and half-disdainfully, "like a parlor-maid." She had caught up an old straw hat of her uncle's and fastened it on her head with a strip of velvet ribbon passed over the top and tied beneath her chin. It looked quaint and picturesque, and a more charming face than the one it framed could not have been imagined. The bright, dark eyes, curtained by such inky, sweeping lashes, would in themselves alone have made a plain face beautiful, but Jaquelina had delicate, well-cut features, and lovely scarlet lips, parting over small, regular, white teeth. No amount of shabby dressing could have made her a fright or a dowdy with that radiant face. The _brune_ tint, acquired by the too ardent kisses of the wind and sun, marred it a little, but the soft, rich color in her cheeks almost atoned for the fault. It was a lovely day and a lovely river. The bending trees overhung the green, flowery banks and threw their long, grateful shadows across the sunny water. It was so clear you could see the pebbles in the bottom and the silvery little fish darting to and fro. Walter and Valchester took turns in rowing. Sometimes they would suffer the boat to drift at its will while they chattered and laughed in the gay thoughtlessness of youth. Long afterward, when winter was in the sky and the clouds of sorrow overhung their lives, they looked back upon these two days--this one upon the river and yesterday beneath the blossoming apple-boughs--as golden days that were like beautiful pictures set in their memory. The next day Walter Earle and his friend went back to the University.