With perfect courtesy the lawyer swallowed his mistake. "Oh, excuse
me," he said. "I forgot. But with her height--"

"She hasn't any height," groaned Stanton. "I tell you she's little."

"Choose to suit yourself," said the lawyer coolly. He himself had
admired Cornelia from afar off.

The next night, to Stanton's mixed feelings of relief and
disappointment the "surprise" seemed to consist in the fact that
nothing happened at all. Fully until midnight the sense of relief
comforted him utterly. But some time after midnight, his hungry mind,
like a house-pet robbed of an accustomed meal, began to wake and fret
and stalk around ferociously through all the long, empty, aching,
early morning hours, searching for something novel to think about.

By supper-time the next evening he was in an irritable mood that made
him fairly clutch the special delivery letter out of the postman's
hand. It was rather a thin, tantalizing little letter, too. All it
said was,

"To-night, Dearest, until one o'clock, in a cabbage-colored
gown all shimmery with green and blue and September
frost-lights, I'm going to sit up by my white birch-wood
fire and read aloud to you. Yes! Honest-Injun! And out of
Browning, too. Did you notice your copy was marked? What
shall I read to you? Shall it be

"'If I could have that little head of hers