I don't remember much about the succeeding frivolities of that April evening. Sometimes I catch again a few fugitive snatches of the melody that inspired the mazy throng; I remember what I wore—it served long years of umbrageous usefulness as a lamp shade after I was through with it; and I think I danced nearly every dance, no foreboding of soberer days chastening the gladness. And I forgot all about the elder question, wondering no more where he might lay his devoted head. But before Mr. Frank Slocum bade me good-night as I disappeared within the heavy oaken door of my uncle's house, he unwittingly recalled the subject.
"You're expecting a visitor to-morrow, aren't you?" he said.
"Oh, yes," I answered, suddenly remembering. "Yes, we're going to have one of the men attending the Presbytery; I think it's to be an elder—and I'm afraid it's him for the attic," I concluded. It was half-past two and I was too tired to bother about grammar.
"I wasn't thinking about the Presbytery," returned Mr. Slocum, and he smiled in the moonlight. "Somebody else is coming, isn't he?"
Whereat I hope I blushed; it was the time for that mystic operation. For I knew he referred to Charlie, dear old Charlie, who made his pious pilgrimage once a month—and I was the shrine.
"Yes, he's coming," I said, toying with the knocker as I spoke.
"You don't seem as jubilant about it as you ought to be," ventured Mr. Frank.
"You don't know how I feel," said I; "maybe I'm jubilant inside."
"Then you shouldn't sigh," pursued my escort.
"I didn't know I sighed—but, even if I did, perhaps sighs are like dreams, and go by contraries," I returned, making the best stand I could. "A maiden's heart is an unknown sea," I affirmed, quoting from some distant poem.