In suggesting to Ben what she believed to be Kate's feeling toward him, Miss Chatterwits was governed by various motives. Chief, probably, was her belief that her interference was really for Kate's good. "I wish that somebody had ever interfered for me," she said to herself, thinking of the one young man who had ever interested her, who she really believed had been prevented only by bashfulness from reciprocating her feelings. "I believe it's the duty of older people to try to bring things about," she thought. "At any rate, I don't believe Kate could be offended at what I said. I know when people are just fitted for each other. Miss Theodora don't understand about those things. She's all wrong about it's being Ernest and Kate. She isn't observing. Mrs. Stuart Digby would a sight rather it had been Ernest than Ben, little as she cared for Ernest; and I'd be glad enough to help on things, just for the sake of bothering Mrs. Digby. She never looks my way when she meets me, and I did hear that she told Kate she wished she wouldn't come to see me so much. Well, it's easier to look behind you than ahead, and I'll not say another word to Ben or Kate, but I'll wait and see."
Ben tried to attach no importance to what Miss Chatterwits had said.
"Suppose Kate does wear my picture in her locket—we're very old friends, and that does not signify anything."
The next day he chanced to meet Kate at the crowded Winter Street crossing, after she had been shopping. Even as he piloted her across the street, threading his way under the very feet of the car and carriage horses, his eye fell on the old-fashioned locket dangling from her fob.
"Whose picture have you in that locket? Whose picture have you in that locket?" echoed itself in a dangerous refrain in his mind, until he feared that he should utter the words aloud.
It was a clear, crisp afternoon; the few autumn leaves that had fallen cracked under their feet; the afternoon sun shone on the State House dome until it looked itself like a second sun.
"Did you ever know so delightful a day?" said Kate.
"Never," said Ben positively. They took the longest way home, skirting the edge of the Frog Pond; and then—what would Mrs. Digby have said?—they sat down on a settee.
Except for some small boys on the opposite shore sailing a refractory toy boat, they were almost alone, though in the very heart of the city. Kate gazed abstractedly at the clear reflection of the tall trees in the mirror before them. She dared not look at Ben, for she felt his eyes upon her, and this knowledge made her heart beat uncomfortably.
She fingered nervously the little package that she had brought from down town, and tried to think of something to say to break the spell. Ben saw that she avoided his eyes, and after waiting vainly for a glance from her, he could bear the strain no longer. Speak he must, and would. For what reason could Kate have for treasuring that memento of himself, if it were not that?—