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know, by and by. But I like all the better to have it left just as it is for a while, so that if we should ever put it on paper he needn't feel that he had hurried into the thing too rashly."

"I understand," I replied; and I pressed his hand warmly, for his frankness and genuineness had pleased me.

When they were gone, I pondered several minutes on the novelty and boyish na?vet? of the whole proceeding, and found myself a good deal refreshed by the sincerity of the two young fellows and their fine confidence in the perfectibility of the future. It seemed to me, the more I thought of it, that I could hold on to this scheme of theirs as a help to myself in retaining a healthy freshness of spirit. "At any rate," I said, "I won't allow myself to go adrift into cynicism as long as they keep faith with their ideal."

Near the end of the two years' limit, when the boon companions were on the eve of taking their degrees, I found that another element had come into their affairs.

Going out one evening to visit a friend who lived at some distance on one of the large railroads, I had a glimpse of a small manufacturing place, which the train passed with great rapidity at late twilight. The large mill was already lighted up, and every window flashed as we sped by. But the sunset had not quite faded, and, from the colored sky far away behind the mill, light enough still came to show the narrow glen with its wall of autumn foliage on either side, the black and silent river above the dam, the sudden shining screen of falling water at the dam itself, and again a smooth dark current below, running toward us and under the railroad embankment. There was a small settlement of operatives' houses near the factory, and two or three larger homes were visible, snugly placed among the trees. We were swept away out of sight in a moment; but there was something so striking in that single glimpse, that a traveller in the next seat, who had not spoken to me before, turned and asked me what place it was. I did not know. I afterward learned that it was Stansby, a factory village perhaps forty miles from Cambridge. Finding that the memory of the spot clung to me, I wished to know more about it; and one day in the following spring, when I needed a change from the city, I actually went out there. Stansby did not prove to be a very picturesque place; yet its gentle hills, with outcroppings of cold granite, the deep-hued river between, and the cotton-mill near the railroad, somehow roused a decided interest which I never have been able wholly to account for. I enjoyed strolling about, but was beginning to think of a train back to Boston, when a turn of the road, a quarter of a mile from the mill, brought me face to face with a young girl who was approaching slowly with a book in her hand, which she read as she walked.

She was not a beautiful girl, and not at all what is understood by a "brilliant" girl; yet at the very first look she excited my interest, as Stansby village itself had done. In every outline and motion she showed perfect health; her clear color was tonic to the eye; her deep brown hair, at the same time that it gave a restful look to her forehead, added something of fervency to her general aspect. In sympathy with the beautiful day, she had taken off her hat , disclosing a spray of fresh lilacs in her hair. She was very simply, though not poorly, dressed. All this, and more, I was able to observe without disturbing her absorption in her book; but just as I was trying to decide whether the firm, compressed corners of her mouth only meant interest in the reading, or indicated some peculiar hardness of character, she glanced up and saw my eyes bent upon her.

Then, for an instant, there came into her own a look of eager search; no softly inquiring gaze, such as would be natural to most women on a casual meeting of this sort, but a full, energetic, self-reliant scrutiny. I don't think the compression about her lips was softened by her surprise at seeing me; but that keen level look from her eyes brought a wonderful change over her face, so that from being interesting it became attractive, and I was fired by a kind of enthusiasm in beholding it. Involuntarily I took off my hat, and paused at the side of the highway. She bent her head again,--perhaps with some acknowledgment of my bow, but not definitely for that purpose, because she continued reading as she passed me.

But now came the strangest part of the episode. This girl disappeared around the bend of the road, and after her two young fellows drew near whom I recognized as Vibbard and Silverthorn. It happened that Silverthorn, as on the very first day I had ever seen him, carried a sprig of lilac. Happened? No; the lilac in the girl's hair was too strong a coincidence to be overlooked, and I was not long in guessing that there was some tender meaning in it.

"Hullo! Ferguson."

"Did you know we were here?"

These exclamations were made with some confusion, and Silverthorn blushed faintly.

They looked at each other confidentially.

"We have, lately," Vibbard admitted.

"Then perhaps you can tell me who that girl is that I just passed."

"Oh, yes," said Silverthorn, at once. "That's Ida Winwood, the daughter of the superintendent here at the mills."

"She is a very striking girl," I said. "You know her, of course?"

"A little."

Vibbard enlarged upon this: it was a curious habit they had fallen into, of each waiting for the other to explain what should more properly have been explained by himself.

"Thorny's father, you know," said Vibbard, "was a great machinist, and so they had acquaintances around at mills in different parts of the State. She--that is Ida, you know--is only sixteen now, but Thorny first saw her when he was a boy and came here, once or twice, with his father."

Silverthorn nodded his head corroboratively.

"But it seems to me," I said, addressing him, "that you treat her rather distantly for an old acquaintance; or else she treats you distantly. Which is it?"

They laughed, and Vibbard blurted out, with a queer, boyish grimace:

"It's nearer the truth," returned his friend, "to say that you're so bashful you don't give her half a chance to make known what she does think of you."

"Oh, time enough--time enough," said Vibbard, good-humoredly.

Remembering that I must hurry back to catch my train, I suddenly found that I had been in an abstracted mood, for I was still standing with my hat off.

"Well, let me know how you get on," I said, jocosely, as I parted from the comrades.

Yet for the life of me I could not tell which one of them it was that I should expect to hear from as a suitor for the girl's hand.

It was within a fortnight after this that they came to my office--for I had been admitted to the bar--and announced that the time for drawing up their long-pending agreement had arrived. They were still as eager as ever about it, and I very soon had the instrument made out, stating the mutual consideration, and duly signed and sealed.

Finding that they had been at Stansby again, I was prompted to ask them more about Ida.

"Do you know," I said, boldly, "that I am very much puzzled as to which of you was the more interested in her?"

They took it in good part, and Silverthorn answered:

"That's not surprising. I don't know, myself."

"I'm trying," said Vibbard, bluntly, "to make Thorny fall in love with her. But I can't seem to succeed."

Vibbard turned to me with an expression of ridicule.

"Yes," he said, "Thorny is as much wrapped up in that idea as if his own happiness depended on my marrying her."

"You're rivals then, after a new fashion," was my comment. "Don't you see, though, how you are to settle it?"

"No."

"Why, each of you should propose in form, for the other. Then Miss Winwood would have to take the difficulty into her own hands."

"Ha, ha!" laughed Vibbard. "That's a good idea. But suppose she don't care for either of us?"

"Very well. I don't see that in that case she would be worse off than yourselves, for neither of you seems to care for her."

"Oh yes, we do!" exclaimed Silverthorn, instantly.

"Yes, we care a great deal," insisted Vibbard.

They both grew so very earnest over this that I didn't dare to continue the subject, and it was left in greater mystery than before.

At last the time of graduation came, and the two friends parted to pursue their separate ways. Silverthorn had a widowed mother living at a distance in the country, whose income had barely enabled her to send him through college on a meagre allowance. He went home to visit her for a few days, and then promptly took his place on a daily newspaper in Boston, where he spent six months of wretched failure. He had great hopes of achieving in a short time some prodigious triumph in writing, but at the end of this period he gave it all up, and decided to develop the mechanical genius which he thought he had perhaps inherited from his father. I began to have a suspicion when I learned that this new turn had led him to Stansby, where he procured a position as a sort of clerk to the superintendent, Winwood.

After some months, I went out to see him there. In the evening we went to the Winwoods', and I watched closely to discover any signs of a new relation between Silverthorn and the daughter. Mr. Winwood himself was a homely, perfectly commonplace man, whose face looked as if it had been stamped with a die which was to furnish a hundred duplicate physiognomies. Mrs. Winwood was a fat, woolly sort of woman, who knitted, and rocked in her rocking-chair, keeping time to her needles. A smell of tea and chops came from the adjoining room, where they had been having supper; and there was a big, hot-colored lithograph of Stansby Mills hung up over the fireplace, with one or two awkward-looking engravings of famous men and their families on the remaining wall-spaces. Yet, even with these crude and barren surroundings, the girl Ida retained a peculiar and inspiring charm. She talked in a full, free tone of voice, and was very sensible; but in everything she said or did, there was a mixture, with the prosaic, of something so sweet and fresh, that I could not help thinking she was very remarkable. In particular, there was that strong, fine look from the eyes which had impressed me on my first casual meeting in the road. It had a transforming power, and seemed to speak of resolution, aspiration, or self-sacrifice. I noticed with what enthusiasm she glanced up at Silverthorn, when he was showing her some drawings of machinery, executed by himself, and was dilating upon certain improvements which he intended to make. Still, there was a reserve between them, and a timidity on his part, which showed that no engagement to marry had been made, as yet.

He was very silent as we walked together beside the dark river toward the railroad, after our call. But, when we came abreast of the dam, with its sudden burst of noise, and its continual hissing murmur, he stopped short, with a look of passion in his face.

"Things have changed since Vibbard went away," he said. "Yes, yes; very much. I used to think it was he who ought to love her."

"And you have found out--" I began.

He laid his hand quickly on my arm.

"Yes, I have found that it is I who love her--eternally, truly! But don't tell any one of this; it seems to me strange that I should speak of it, even to you. I cannot ask her to marry me yet. But there seems to be a relief in letting you know."

I was expressing my pleasure at being of any use to him, when the ominous sound of the approaching cars made itself heard, and I had to hurry off. But, all the way back to the city, I could think of nothing but Silverthorn's announcement; and suddenly there flashed upon me the secret and the danger of the whole situation. This girl, who had so much interested the two friends, in spite of their strong contrasts of character, was, perhaps, the only one in the world who could have pleased them both; for in her own person she seemed to display a mixture of elements, much the same and quite as decided as theirs. What, then, if Vibbard also should wake up to the knowledge of a love for her?

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