Looking out of the western window, Pearl Watson, with a faint wrinkle
between her eyebrows, admitted to herself that it was not a cheerful
day. And Pearl had her own reasons for wanting fine weather, for
tomorrow was the first of March, and the day to which she had been
looking forward for three years to make a momentous decision.

The thought of this day had gone with her in the three years that had
passed, like a radiant gleam, a glorious presence that brightened and
idealized every experience of life, a rainbow that glorified every
black cloud, and there had been some clouds in her life black enough
to bring out the rainbows' colors too; as when her mother's serious
illness had called her back from the city, where she was attending
school. But each day had brought her one day nearer the great day,
which now she could call "Tomorrow."

It had never occurred to Pearl to doubt the young doctor's sincerity,
when, three years before, he had said he would wait until she was
eighteen years old before he asked her something.

"And it will depend on your answer," he had said, "what sort of a day
it is. It may be a dark, cold, horrible day, with cruel, biting wind,
or it may be a glorious day, all sunshine and blue sky--that will all
depend on your answer." And she had told him, honestly and truthfully,
not being skilled in the art of coquetry, that "it generally was fine
on the first of March."

That the young doctor might have forgotten all about the incident
never crossed her mind in the years that followed. She did not know
that there was witchery in her brown eyes and her radiant young beauty
that would stir any young man's heart and loosen his tongue, causing