"But it is the truth!" persisted Nattie. "Even my name, for instance, proves it! I was christened Nathalie, a very fine poetic name. But, in all my life no one ever called me by it! I was always mediocre Nattie!"
"And I have curtailed you down to Nat!" said Cyn, with whimsical remorse. "But what a tangle we are in! First it was the man of musk and bear's grease, who came between you! Then, when he was explained away, came blundering I! Why did you not lock me out of sight somewhere? I would have done it myself had I known—" ironically— "what an extremely fascinating and dangerous person I was!"
At this Nattie could not help smiling.
"Is was not your fault; it was Fate!" she said, her smile becoming a sigh, that Cyn echoed, for she thought of Jo. But yet unconvinced, she said,
"Fate! No; it cannot be! I think better of Clem than to believe he, too, has made a mistake, like Quimby, and fallen in love with the wrong woman!" then starting up, she exclaimed, tragically, "Who? ah! who shall cut the Gordian knot and bring about a crisis that shall cause this 'wired love' to terminate in 'O. K.'?"
As if invoked by Cyn's words, there came a sneeze from outside, and Miss
Kling pushed open the door unceremoniously.
"I wish to have some conversation with you, Miss Rogers," she said in a tone of severity.
"Some other time, if you please," Nattie replied, impatiently, for her talk with Cyn had unnerved her; "just now I am engaged."
Miss Kling drew herself up and said, with even more austerity,
"There is no time like the present, and since Miss Archer is here, it may not be amiss for her to hear what I have to say."