But she moved away suddenly down a tempting path, and, perforce, he followed her.
"I've been thinking," she said hurriedly, "about Mr. Gard. I'm sure, if he felt he was hurting your feelings, he wouldn't think all his own way. Now, if you want me to, I'll try and make him understand it. I'll tell him that you came to me in an awful huff--all cut up. I'm sure I can put it strongly enough."
"And I shall go to him, and complain that when I want to talk with you, you put me off--won't listen to me. I'll ask him to make you listen to reason. I'll tell him to put it to you. I'll show him that I am cut up, all around the heart. Perhaps he can put it to you strongly enough--"
Dorothy stopped short and wheeled around to face him.
"Oh, very well, then," she smiled, "if you are going to get someone else to do your love making for you, I apply for the position. Teddy Mahr, will you marry the milkmaid?--Honest and true, black and blue?"
"I will!" he cried ecstatically, and caught her in his arms.
Two wrens upon a neighboring branch, tilted forward to watch them, the business of nest building for the moment forgotten. A gray squirrel, with jerking tail and mincing gate, approached along the path. A florid policeman, wandering aimlessly in this remote arbor, stopped short, grinned, stuck his thumbs in his belt, and contemplated the picture, then wheeled about and stole out of sight in fashion most unmilitary. Across the lake the white swans glided, and two little "mandarin" ducks sidled up close to shore, regarding the moveless group of humans with bright and beady eyes.
Dorothy disengaged herself from his arms with a happy little gurgle, set her hat straight upon her tumbled hair, and glanced at the ducks.
"There," she said softly, "that's a lucky sign. In China they always send the newlyweds a pair. They are love birds; they die when separated--which means, I'm a duck."
"You are," he agreed, and kissed her again.