She smiled a little sadly, the smile which seems to belong to the lips of such women, fashioned to be good wives and mothers, and nothing more. She put up her hand and touched his hair shyly; she seldom caressed him.
“She is always sitting up all night with some one or other. It seems to be a fad of hers. And you know I trust you absolutely.” (He had the grace to blush.) “But, I think, if you don’t mind, that I’ll announce the engagement.”
“Why, of course I don’t mind,” he said, taken aback. “It was your idea to keep it quiet, not mine.”
“Yes; but I think I’d like her to know.”
As Clive left the cottage he met Rollins.
“I have something to tell you, old chap,” he said awkwardly. “I want you to congratulate me. I am engaged to Miss Gordon.”
“The devil you are!” exclaimed Rollins slapping him vigorously on the back, “I do congratulate you, old fellow, she’s a jewel of a girl. Going to marry here?”
“Yes, in San Francisco.”
“The club will give you a send-off the night before. You won’t look as handsome on your wedding-morn as you otherwise might, and you’ll have a dark brown taste in your mouth, but in a long period of domestic bliss you’ll have a great joy to look back upon.”
They walked down to the camp together, then Rollins left abruptly and returning to Yorba went to the telephone office.