I carried my machine home. Machines are heavy things. A sort of rainy snow was falling, and though it was only four in the afternoon, it was beginning to grow dark. The streets were in a bad state with slush and mud and ice, and I got very wet on my way to the car, for I couldn't put up an umbrella, as I had to carry my machine under one arm and my manuscript under the other.

As soon as I walked into our house, Margaret called out from the dining-room:

"Mr. Hamilton is here." Then he got up—he was having tea with them—and came over to me. I had the type-writer in my hand, and I don't know whether I dropped it or set it down on the floor.

I hadn't had any luncheon, I was soaked through. I had worked for weeks on my novel, and, besides the office work, I had type-written that long play. I had been working day and night, and I had been insulted and discharged. I was tired out, cold, and wet. Add to this the sudden shock of seeing Mr. Hamilton, and you will understand why even a healthy girl of eighteen may sometimes faint.

It was only a little faint, and I came to while Roger was carrying me up-stairs; but I did not move, for his face was against mine.

Mama had come up with us, and when Roger set me on the couch, she said she'd take charge of me. She told him to go down-stairs and have Margaret make me a toddy, and to bring it up on a tray with my dinner. I felt like a big baby to have her fussing over me and taking off all my wet things. I had a lovely pink eider-down dressing-gown that she had made me, and she forced me to get into that and into dry stockings and slippers.

By this time Roger and Margaret came up with the tray, and all three were doing things for me. Roger himself mixed me a drink. It was hot, with brandy and lemon in it. As soon as I drank it, it went right to my head, for I had eaten nothing since morning, and I tried to tell them about Mrs. Martin's discharging me, and how that author had not paid me for all my work.

Cloudy as my head was and stumblingly as I talked, I won their sympathies. Roger said that the author was a mean little sneak, a cursed small cur, and that he'd like to kick him all over the town.

Then, because I started to cry, they tried to make me eat something and drink some coffee; but I was so sleepy I could not keep my eyes open. The first thing I knew, I was in my bed.

I slept and slept; I slept till ten o'clock the next day. The first thought I had was that Roger must have gone. I never dressed so quickly, and I ran to his room and knocked; but he was not there.

Margaret also had departed for work, but I found mama in the kitchen. She was making me an oyster stew, a thing for which I had acquired a liking. As soon as I appeared, she cried:

"You bad girl, what did you get up for? Here's a note for you."

With hands trembling with excitement, I read Roger's first letter to me. It was like him, those two brief, laconic sentences:

Back by noon. Stay in bed.

Roger.

Stay in bed! I never felt better in my life. I had my stew, and then I went up-stairs and finished copying my novel.

At noon to the minute Roger returned. He had all sorts of things for me: flowers,—orchids, mind you!—squab, fruit, jelly, and magazines. One would think I was an invalid, and I had to laugh at his look of disapproval when he discovered me busy at work. He said I was incorrigible.

He made no effort that day to conceal his feelings from me. It was not that he petted or caressed me; but he fussed over me all day, kept me right by the fire, and brought up my luncheon to me, as he said the lower floor was draughty. He kept feeling my head to see if I was feverish. I think I gave him a good fright the night before. He said he ought to have returned to Richmond the previous night, as there was important business there that needed his attention. He'd been obliged to keep the wires scorching all the morning. He would have to get away that night, however; but he wanted to make absolutely certain that I had recovered.

He said that he had been obliged to hasten his return, neglecting certain business in Europe, because I had not written to him as I promised to do. I did write him once, but the letter must have miscarried. However, he was not in a scolding mood that day, and every minute I thought he was going to pick me up in his arms.

He wanted to know if I had missed him, and I tried to pretend that I hadn't, that I had been absorbed in my writing. He looked so solemn over that and so far, far away from me that I wanted instantly to put my arms about his neck, and I debated with myself how I could reach him. I pulled up the stool in front of him, stood on it, and in that way reached his face. I gave him a quick kiss, and then jumped down. I thought he would laugh at that, but he didn't. I did though; but while I was laughing I suddenly thought of something that frightened me, and I asked him if he had had a fine time in Europe, and added that I supposed he had seen many lovely women.

I had a vague idea that France was simply brimming with fascinating, irresistible, and beautiful sirens whom no man could possibly resist, and the thought that Roger had been there made my heart almost stop beating; but not for long, for he said very gravely:

"I never noticed anything nor any one. My mind was engrossed with one thought only—my own little girl in Chicago."

Then he asked me if I realized that he had spent fewer than ten days in Europe, and that he had come here to me before even going to his home.

"Goodness!" I said slyly, "you are interested in me, aren't you?"

He looked at me queerly then, and he said:

"Nora, I'm 'dippy' about you."

"Is that slang for love, Roger?" I asked, which made him laugh, and then he tried to frown at me; but he could not. So he changed the subject abruptly, and made me tell him about all the things that had happened to me while he was away.

He said I was a "precious angel" for giving up Bennet, and that Butler was a "conceited pup," and I was a "little idiot" to mind anything he said. He wished he had been there. He said Mrs. Martin was a sycophant and a kowtowing old snob, and that he knew her well; and as for my going on the stage! One would think I was considering jumping off the face of the earth.

I told him he was pretty nearly as bad as the little Japanese, and he laughed and said:

"That Jap's all right. By George! I like his idea. It would give me peculiar satisfaction to wring the necks of one or two people we know," and he clapped his fist into his hand.

I said mischievously:

"Well, you know that Jap hated those enemies of mine because he loved me."

Roger chuckled, and said I might sit on that stool and hint till doomsday, but he was not going to tell me he loved me till he was good and ready.

"When will that be?" I asked, and he said solemnly, with mock gravity:

"My father always said that there was no time like the present," I replied.

He laughed, but said seriously:

"Nora, if you play with fire, you'll be burned. Burns leave scars. Scars are ugly things, and I love only pretty things, like my precious little girl."

"Aha!" I said triumphantly, "then you admit it at last."

He burst out laughing and said:

"Trapped! Help!"

After a while he wanted to hear my novel. So then I read it to him, my beautiful story.

I read it well, as only an author can read his own work—not well in the sense of elocution, but with every important point brought out. It took me two and a half hours to read it, and when I was through, twilight had settled. I had read the last words chiefly by the light of the blazing fire. Roger got up, and walked up and down the room. I watched him from my seat on the stool by the fire. Then he suddenly came back to me, seized my manuscript, and made a motion as if he would consign it to the flames. At that I screamed, like an outraged mother, and caught at it, and he stood towering over me, watching me curiously.

"I wanted to try you then, Nora," he said. "Now I know that I have a bigger rival in your work than any man. What am I to do?"

I held my novel out to him.

"Burn it if you wish to, then. It represents only the product of my fancy; but you are my life," I said.

"Do you mean that?" he asked me, and I replied:

"Oh, yes, I do, I do."

"If I asked you to give up your writing, as I asked you to give up Bennet, would you do it for me?"

"Yes, everything and every one, Roger," I replied, "if only you will love me. Won't you?" In a voice full of emotion, he then said:

"Can you doubt it?"

A moment later he seemed to regret having revealed himself like that, and he swiftly made ready to go. He was taking an early train for Richmond. His man was waiting for him at some hotel. I wanted to go down to the door with him, but he would not let me, and we said good-by before mama, who had come up to say dinner was ready. He didn't kiss me, but I kissed him right before mama, on his hand and sleeve. If I could have reached his face, I would have kissed him there. He kept smoothing my hair. He said he would be back very soon, that he would never stay away from me long now.

I watched him from the window. The rain of the previous day had frozen on the trees, and everything was glistening and slippery. A wind was coming from the north, and the people went along the street as if blown against their will.

Roger looked up before getting into the cab and waved to me at the window, and I thought, as once before I had thought, as I watched his carriage disappear, that perhaps it would always be like this. He would always go. Would there ever come a day when he would not come again?

That was on the twenty-sixth of February. He could not have stayed in Richmond more than a few hours, for at ten o'clock the following night he came back to me.

I was running over some new pieces at the piano when I heard the bell ring; but I had no idea it was he until he came into the room without knocking. There was something about his whole appearance and attitude that startled me. His face had a grayish, haggard look, as if he had not slept. I ran up to him, but he held me back and began to speak rapidly:

"Nora, I've only a few minutes in Chicago. I must catch the 11:09 back to Richmond. It's after ten now. My cab's at the door. This is what I've come for. I want you to go to-morrow, on as early a train as you can get, to a little hunting-lodge of mine in the Wisconsin woods. Holmes [his valet] will come and take you, and I want you to stay there for a week or ten days."

The oddness of his request naturally puzzled me, and of course I exclaimed about it, and wanted to know why he wished me to go there. He said irritably:

"What does it matter why? I want you to go. I insist upon it, in fact."

"But what will I do up there?" I asked.

"Anything you wish. Write, if you like. I've a man and woman there. You'll not be entirely alone. The change will do you good."

"Aren't you going to be there, too?"

"I'm afraid not. I'll try to get there for the weekend if I possibly can."

"But I don't want to go to a place all alone, Roger."

"I tell you, you won't be alone. I have a man and a woman there, and Holmes will take you."

"But I don't see the sense in going away out there in the middle of winter."

"I particularly want you to go. Are my wishes nothing to you, then? I want you out of Chicago for a few days. You've not been well and—"

"I never felt better in my life."

"Nora, I want you to go. You must go. Do this thing to please me."

As, puzzled, I still hesitated, he began to promise that he would join me there the next day, and when I still did not assent, he tried coaxing me in another way. He said he'd bring Verley and a hunting-dog, and he'd teach me how to ride horseback and to shoot. He had horses, too, somewhere near there; a big stock farm, I think. I told him I didn't want to shoot or kill things.

By this time he had worked himself up to a state of exasperation at my stubbornness, and his request really seemed to me so ridiculous and capricious that I began to laugh at him, saying jokingly:

"You're worse than a dog in a manger: you're a Turk. You want to shut me up in a box."

"That's true enough," he replied. "I wish I'd done it long ago."

He was standing very tall and stiff by the door, with his coat still on, and his arms folded grimly across his breast. I looked at him, and a half-mischievous, half-tender impulse overwhelmed me. I went closer to him, and put my hands on his folded arms as I said:

"I'll go, Roger, if you'll take me in your arms and kiss me."

He gave me such a look at that, and then his face broke, and he opened his arms. I went into them. I don't know how long I was in his arms. I never wanted to leave them again.

I presently heard his voice, low and husky, and felt he was trying to release himself from my hands. He said:

"I must go. I'll miss my train."

"O Roger, please don't leave me now!" I begged.

"I must," he replied, and then he went quickly out of the room. I followed him into the hall, though he was striding along so swiftly I could not keep pace with him. Just where the stairs began, I caught at his arm and held him.

"O Roger, you do love me, don't you?" I asked sobbingly, and he said hoarsely:

"Yes, I do."

Then he went down the stairs, and I after him. At the door he said I must go back; but I was still clinging to his hand, and when he opened the door I, too, went out.

Snow was falling densely, and the great north wind had brought on its wing a blizzard and storm such as Chicago had seldom known; but Roger and I, in that porch, saw nothing but each other.

He kept urging me to go in, saying I would catch my death of cold, and stooping down, and without my asking him this time, he took me in his arms and kissed me again and again.

"I love you, Nora," he said. "You're the only thing in the world I have ever loved. I swear that to you, darling."

Then he kissed me again, opened the door, and turned me back.

"Roger, tell me just this, at least," I pleaded. "Is there any other woman in your life?"

The question was out now. Like a haunting shadow that I dared not face there had always been that horrible thought in my mind, and now for the first time I had voiced it. With his arms still about me, looking down into my face, he said:

"No; no one that counts. I swear that, too, Nora."

Then I went in. I was like one in a beautiful trance. That room seemed to me the loveliest place on earth. Everything about it spoke of him. He had chosen the softly tinted Oriental rugs, the fine paintings,—there were paintings by great masters there,—my piano, and the great long table where I wrote. He had chosen all these things for me, and now I knew why he had done it. He loved me; he had said so at last.

I went about the room touching everything, and gathering up little things of his—papers and books; I went into his bedroom, and found his bath-robe. I put it on, and for the first time—though he had said the rooms were mine, I had not used them—I threw myself down there in the room where he had slept and all night long I lay dreaming of him.