"Let you? It is your home. Oh Jack, I am afraid of your tone. You haven’t given up. I must tell you, though, that Mildred would be honest, uncompromisingly honest, in a serious matter like that. She is not a coquette."
"If she doesn’t love you, you do not want her."
"I don’t know whether she loves me or not, and I don’t believe she knows any better."
As his handsome, frank eyes looked up at her, Clover’s heart swelled with the approval and admiration she felt.
"We must relax to it," she said involuntarily.
"Or brace up to it," he replied, with his brilliant smile; "but it is too late now for the Petruchio act, Clover. I have literally and figuratively given myself away."
"Yes," said the other simply; "what you have to do now is to leave her in freedom. The Lord loves you both alike. If He does not give you Mildred, it will be because that marriage would stand in the way of your real advancement."
"Do you really believe that?" Van Tassel regarded her in curiosity and surprise.
"Why, Jack, think it out some time. How can it be any other way?" she answered, speaking hastily, for she heard a rustle on the stairs; and a moment after her voice ceased, Mildred came into the room.
She was dressed in a pale violet gown, which revealed her superb neck, and she pulled long gloves up over her bare arms as she came.
Jack sprang to his feet. How could she help liking the homage in his eyes?
"I know I haven’t kept you waiting," she said brightly, "for Mrs. Page’s light is still burning, and of course it will take her some little time to wake up Mr. Page."
Hilda’s feet, in their little black satin slippers, came flying down the stairs as she spoke.
"Is Robert in a hammock?" she exclaimed apprehensively. "I meant to stick them both full of pins, but I haven’t had time. That poor dear man has done a lot to-day, in spite of all my warnings. I expect he will sleep from here to Boston, when we get started. You two girls look perfectly lovely. I shall wake him up with that information."
As they were all finally setting out, Gorham Page came up the walk.
"I thought I would wander down and make sure of you," he said to Clover, as he turned back beside her.
"You were sure of us," she returned. "I have not danced for five years. It seems to me I should never have thought of it again but for your invitation."