country home in summer, they insisted that it was only just for me to
allow them, that second winter after their marriage, to return my
hospitality. This argument alone would hardly have sufficed, for winter
in the country--connected by trolley with the town--is hardly less
delightful to me than summer itself. But there were other and convincing
arguments, and they ended by bringing me to the city for a month's visit
in the heart of the season.

On the first morning at breakfast--I had arrived late the night
before--there was much to talk about.

"It's a curious fact," said the Skeptic, stirring a cup of yellow-brown
coffee with which his wife had just presented him, "as Hepatica and I
discovered only the other day, that three of those girls who visited you
that summer four years ago, when she and I were avoiding each other----"

"You--avoiding!" I interpolated.

"Well--I was trying to avoid being avoided by her," he explained. "Three
of those girls are married and living in town."

"Yes, I know," said I. "At least I know Camellia and Althea are. Who
else? Azalea lives across the river, doesn't she?"

"Yes. You haven't heard of the latest matrimonial alliance, then?" The
Skeptic chuckled. Hepatica looked at him, and he looked at her, and then
they both looked at me. "Dahlia was married yesterday," the Skeptic
announced with relish, "in a manse study, with two witnesses."

I was astounded. I had just come from home, and Dahlia was my next