The boy's hand went swiftly into an inner pocket and drew out of a small envelope a tiny withered rose bud, quite browned and crumply. He held it silently over to her across the table, his eyes shining with delight.
She looked at it with an attempt at impersonal curiosity, and then the corners of her mouth crinkled up, and that flickering dimple came into play and she met his eyes with enjoyment as keen as his own.
"And you all sang to me," she reminded, "and I never was so excited before."
"Every one of us kept one of the flowers," he told her. "We didn't know who dropped them to us, we could only see just the fluff of your light hair--but we carry them just for luck. They are sort of insignia of adventure--"
"I was so afraid I'd killed you," Peggy confessed, "and I thought the only thing I could do to atone would be to go and be a Red Cross nurse, and help those that other people tried to kill."
The young man threw back his head and laughed until the boys at the other tables looked over and grinned in sympathy.
Peggy hastily turned her attention to her soup and ate in silence.
When they had finished their hot chocolate, too, she glanced out at the uninviting storm and sighed.
"It must be miles back to Andrews," she said. "I suppose we'd better start. The storm makes it awfully dark, doesn't it?"
The lights had been turned on in the little tea house and in contrast to their radiant cheer and that of the dancing flames in the fireplace, the outside world with its deep gray swirl of snow flakes looked very black and chill.
"It's not so much the storm--or not that only,--it must be five o'clock, anyway, you know."
Peggy jumped. "Oh, no, how _could_ it be? We won't get home in time, then."
"Yes, every girl has to be in her room at five-thirty so as to have plenty of time to dress for dinner at six. And the rule is partly to make it certain that we'll be in before it's very dark, too, I suppose."
"Well, we'll make a dive for it," he said. He drew out his watch, and then his face grew red with that same brilliant over-color that it had worn when she first saw him out there in the whipping winds. This time it was not the wind that had sent that flame over his forehead, chin and cheeks,--it was shame that his sense of responsibility should not have warned him of the passing time.