Phyllis, in the path near by, gazed at the fallen man with mirth and anxiety.

"Hurt?" she asked.

He rose and examined a watch which he was carrying in his right hand.

"Crystal smashed," he said, "but still going. And I've got to wait four minutes!"

"Why have you got to wait four minutes?"

"Because I promised to wait ten, and six of them have elapsed. Oh, but won't you be excited when I am at liberty to speak! It's more exciting than when we were lost in the woods, crossing the swamp that had never been crossed before. Meanwhile, let us calm ourselves by talking of something prosaic. How are the tomatoes getting on?"

Phyllis put up her hand in a smiling military salute.

"'General Blank's compliments,'" she said, "'and the colored troops are turning black in the face.'"

"My favorite breakfast dish," said Herring, "is grilled tomatoes, preceded by raw oysters and oatmeal."

"Isn't it nice," said Phyllis, "that there is money in the family after all, and we're going to give up The Camp as an inn?"

"It would have been given up anyway," said Herring. "A determined body of men had so resolved in secret. There's one minute left."

For some reason they found nothing to say during the whole of that minute. When the last second thereof had passed forever, Herring said simply:

"Your sister Lee and Renier are going to be married."

I cannot describe the expression that came over Phyllis's face. It wasn't exactly jealousy; it wasn't exactly the expression of a beautiful female commuter who has just missed her train. It wasn't a wild look, or a happy look, or a sad look. Perhaps it was a little bit more of an aching void look than anything else.

Whatever its exact nature, the wily Herring studied it with an immense satisfaction. And then his heart began to flurry in a sort of panic.

"Lee!" exclaimed Phyllis, "married! Why, they're nothing but children!"

She felt something encircle her waist. She looked down and saw a hand and part of an arm.

"What are you doing?" she asked, in a sort of daze.

"I'm trying to establish a hold on you," said Herring, and toward the end of so saying his voice broke; "and you're not to feel lonely and deserted with me standing here, are you?"

For a moment it seemed to Herring that Phyllis was going to extricate herself from his encircling arm. She achieved, indeed, a quarter revolution to the left and away from him.

"Don't, Phyllis!" he cried. "Don't do it! I couldn't bear it!"

Then she ceased revolving to the left, stopped, and from a startled, uncertain, half-frightened young person became suddenly a warmly loving young person, warmly loved, who revolved suddenly to the right, and became the recipient of a sudden storm of ecstatic exclamations and kisses.

And then, nestling close to the one and only man in the world, she listened with complete satisfaction to his efforts to explain to her just how beautiful and wonderful and good she was.