With first-class questions Magnus had nothing this year to do, but over one furlough point he had a sharp fight with himself. The "cit" clothes in which he had come as a candidate were odious to him on that very account. All the same, one way to save money was to wear them home. So Cadet Kindred braced up mentally, and said that was just what he would do. And then, to put an extra touch to his goodness, he thought he would try them on and see how ugly they were; break it to himself gently, and by degrees, before he walked out through the sallyport in open day.
It was a splendid plan. For lo and behold! under the hard, despised West Point training, Mr. Kindred had grown and filled out and developed until he could not possibly wear those old clothes.
Magnus tossed the coat up to the ceiling, regardless of what might happen to the plaster, and joined the shopping band that very day.
It was delightful now, in the soft spring weather, to go out at every release from quarters, for a stroll round the plain, or down by the river. How lovely Flirtation was! An army of "Dutchman's breeches" held all the best posts among the rocks by the wayside, scaling the cliffs even down by the landing. And in the deeper shade north of Battery Knox, whole beds of dog-tooth violets filled the spots of damper ground, lifting their elegant heads like the highbred beauties that they are.
Among the tougher growths, iron wood and black birch were charming with their tresses, and the young tufts of maple and oak and hickory leaves were a joy to see. Shad blossoms and dogwood "picked out" the green; from some far-down hidden corner the spice bush spiced the air. Saxifrage spread whole sheets of bloom; and Lowell's "dear common flower" gleamed everywhere.
And then the girls came. Some "opening buds" that had come fresh from Paris; and some early birds, besides robins and song sparrows. The company drills had lookers-on; the walks round Flirtation were not always games of solitaire.
Among the visitors who appeared thus early, was a certain Mrs. Granton, with two girls of her own, and two belonging to other people--Miss Bee and Miss Clive. The Granton girls were just average damsels, but, of course, having a gay brother in the first class, they went everywhere, and knew everybody. Miss Clive was an heiress and played ditto, ditto upon yet stronger ground.