She was looking down, unable to go farther without assistance; but he offered none, and they stood for several moments in absolute silence—for a quick spasm of fright had shot across his soul! The sublimity of her partial surrender, contingent only upon his transportation to a foreign battlefield, suddenly brought the war from three thousand miles away to his very door. But his next feeling was one of self-contempt, and squaring his shoulders with a jerk he said:
"I love your pluck! Then it's all settled."
"Oh, it isn't all settled by a great deal," she laughed; but, seeing his face, gasped in mock astonishment. "Heavens! Which is making you look so like a ghost—marriage or war?"
"They're quite synonymous," he replied, trying to match her banter. "May I speak to your illustrious father?"
"That reminds me that I've an engagement with him right now," she exclaimed. "For the present, you may say good-bye to Miss Sallie and Miss Veemie for me."
With a pretty smile and toss of her head she swept him a little courtesy, then turned to the gate, but he called after her:
"Wait! I'll go with you—and show him my targets!"
She stopped, looking back as though she had not heard aright.
"Targets?" she asked, slightly arching her brows.
"Why, these, of course," he cried, drawing them again from his breast pocket. "I always hunt him up, or the Colonel, when I've made a cracker-jack score! It tickles 'em to death!"