"Give me your hand," commanded Dic. The hand was promptly surrendered.
"Now close your eyes," he continued. The eyes were closed, very, very honestly. Rita knew no other way of doing anything, and never so much as thought of peeping. Then Dic lifted the soft little hand to his lips, and slipped the gold band on the third finger.
"Oh, I know what it is now," she cried delightedly, but she would not look till Dic should say "open." "Open" was said, and the girl exclaimed:—
"Oh, Dic, where did you get it?"
Bear this fact in mind: If you live among the trees, the wild flowers, and the birds, you will always remain a child. Rita was little more than a child in years, and I know you will love Dic better because within his man's heart was still the heart of his childhood. The great oak of the forest year by year takes on its encircling layer of wood, but the layers of a century still enclose the heart of a sprig that burst forth upon a spring morning from its mother acorn.
For a moment after Rita asked Dic where he got the ring he regretted he had not bought it, but he said:—
"Billy Little gave it to me that I might give it to you; so it really is his present."
A shade of disappointment spread over her face, but it lasted only a moment.
"But you give it to me," she said. "It was really yours, and you give it to me. I am almost glad it comes from Billy Little. He has been so much to me. You are by nature different from other men, but the best difference we owe to Billy Little." The pronoun "we" was significant. It meant that she also was Billy Little's debtor for the good he had brought to Dic, since now that wonderful young man belonged to her.
"I wonder where he got it?" asked the girl.