has come to me?"

The old man's caution was all gone; his fears now all forgotten. He
was thinking of past days, dear days, young days.

"How shall you know?" he asked, and smiled again, this time in soft,
affectionate derision. "You will not mistake. Mistake? It is
impossible. When your heart leaps at the sound of his dear footsteps;
when the world is empty till he comes and then is, ah, so full that
you are crowded out of it into the valleys of a paradise; when little
chills run over you one moment and the next the hot blood makes your
cheeks into twin roses! How shall you know? Ah, there are many signs!"

"And do you think that such a love will ever come to me?"

"To you? Of course." The old man caught himself up short, just there,
and lost his rapt expression. There were still hopes in his heart of
realization for his daughter of all the brilliant dreams of his own
youth--those dreams which had so sadly gone quite wrong. She must do
nothing which would shut her from it if ever it should become
possible. "Yes; it will come to you, of course; but not for a long
time, and you must be very careful," he added in a greatly altered,
less magnetic voice. "You must love no one until I tell you."

"Can one make love wait?"

"Ah--well--yes--one _must_!"

"But father--"