"I'm mighty sorry, Andy," he said, remorsefully.
"Don't feel too badly," was his friend's reply. "After a winter with us Evelyn will be another girl."
"What?" Lee started in his chair. "Andy, what are you thinking about?"
"Just what I say. Charlotte and I have talked it all over. We've both taken an immense liking to Evelyn and we'd honestly enjoy having her here for the winter. It only remains for you to convince Evelyn herself that we are to be trusted, and to secure her promise that we may have our way with her from first to last, and the thing is done."
"You are sure that's really all there is to it? You're not keeping anything from me?"
"Not a thing. And I'm as sure as a man can well be. That's why I don't prescribe a sanatorium for her, or anything of that sort. All she needs is a rational, every-day life of the health-making kind, such as Charlotte and I can teach her--Charlotte even more effectively than I. Evelyn needs simply to build up a strong physical body; then these troublesome nerves will take care of themselves. Believe me, Thorne, it's refreshingly simple. I've not even a drug to suggest for your sister. She doesn't need any."
"But, Andy, it doesn't seem to me I can let Evelyn stay here with you all winter--the first winter of your married life. You two ought to be alone together."
"No. Charlotte and I haven't set out to go through life--even this first year of it--alone together. We are together, no matter how many we have about us. It will be only in the day's work if we keep Evelyn with us, and it's a sort of work that will pay pretty well, I fancy."
"It certainly will--in more than one kind of coin," and Lee gripped his friend's hand.
So it was settled. Evelyn agreed so joyously to the plan that her brother's last doubt of its feasibility was removed, and he went away a day later with a heart so much lighter than the one he had brought with him that it showed in his whole bearing.