"Dian, I am going to tell you something and ask you for your advice. You know I have great confidence in your judgment."
"Better ask Aunt Clara," said Diantha, afraid to trust her own opinion, where Tom Allen was concerned.
"No, I want to talk to you. Maybe some day I will tell Aunt Clara, too; but, just now, I feel like telling you."
The girl sat with her hand resting on her cheek, gazing into the clear starry sky above them. After a pause she said slowly:
"Dian, do you believe in dreams and visions?"
"Why, yes, of course I do; if they are of the right kind, and not brought on by eating too much."
"Well, I believe that we get many revelations through our dreams, if we only knew how to interpret them." Another pause; then the girl said softly: "Dian, Tom Allen has had a dream or vision about me."
The idea of Tom Allen having anything so serious as a vision almost upset Diantha, but she controlled herself and asked:
"What was the vision?" Diantha was rather curious now to know if she had been really mistaken in her estimate of Tom's character.
"Tom dreamed, or was carried away in a vision, and thought he lay upon his bed, very sick and nigh to death. As he lay there, pondering upon the past and future, he said he saw his door open softly, and, surrounded by a white light, I entered the room, with a banner in my hand, on which was inscribed: 'Marriage or death.' Then the dream ended."