“You are right,” Miller joined in her mood; “the Colonel still has his dogs ready for Alan, but they 'll make it up some day, I hope. Dolly is next to the smartest girl I know.”
“Oh, you are a flatterer,” laughed Adele, and she gave Miller her hand. “Don't forget to be up for early breakfast. We must start soon in the morning. I'm dying to see the home folks.”
Alan was glad that Miller had a room of his own, for he was not in a mood to converse with him; and when Adele had retired he refused Miller's proffered cigar and went to his own room.
Miller grunted as Alan turned away. “He's had bad news of some sort,” he thought, “and it's about Dolly Barclay. I wonder, after all, if she would stick to a poor man. I begin to think some women would. Adele is of that stripe—yes, she is, and isn't she stunning-looking? She's a gem of the first water, straight as a die, full of pluck and—she's all right—all right!”
He went out on the veranda to smoke and enjoy repeating these things over to himself. The bonfires in the street were dying down to red embers, around which stood a few stragglers; but there was a blaze of new light over the young man' s head. Along his horizon had dawned a glorious reason for his existence; a reason that discounted every reason he had ever entertained. “Adele, Adele,” he said to himself, and then his cigar went out. Perhaps, his thoughts ran on in their mad race with happiness—perhaps, with her fair head on her pillow, she was thinking of him as he was of her.
Around the corner came a crowd of young men singing negro songs. They passed under the veranda, and Miller recognized Frank Hillhouse's voice. “That you, Frank?” Miller called out, leaning over the railing.
“Yes—that you, Ray?” Hillhouse stepped out into view. “Come on; we are going to turn the town over. Every sign comes down, according to custom, you know. Old Thad Moore is drunk in the calaboose. They put him in late this evening. We are going to mask and let him out. It's a dandy racket; we are going to make him think we are White Caps, and then set him down in the bosom of his family. Come on.”
“I can't to-night,” declined Miller, with a laugh. “I'm dead tired.”
“Well, if you hear all the church bells ringing, you needn't think it's fire, and jump out of your skin. We ain't going to sleep to-night, and we don't intend to let anybody else do it.”
“Well, go it while you are young,” Miller retorted, with a laugh, and Hillhouse joined his companions in mischief and they passed on singing merrily.