“Thank you, thank you, Miss Raynes!” said he at last, when silence seemed even more dangerous than speech.
“Miss Raynes! Dear me, Allan, how very formal and precise you are! You called me Sue in your letters.”
“Did I? Well, I didn’t know it,” replied Somers with a stroke of candor not to be expected under the circumstances.
“Certainly you did. I don’t think you ever mentioned such a person as Miss Raynes.”
“I am confident I didn’t,” added he with another touch of candor. “But I will always call you Sue hereafter, when I have occasion to speak to you.”
“Thank you, Allan! You begin to sound a little like yourself.”
Somers was very glad to hear it, but wished he had been five miles off, even if it had been in the very jaws of the Fourth Alabama.
“You don’t look a bit like your photograph,” continued Sue, gazing with admiration at the face of the young man; for which those who ever saw Lieutenant Somers will cheerfully pardon her.
“Do you think so?”
“I’m sure you don’t.”