so. Whereat Susy, as if suddenly aware of the presence of passers-by,
assumed an air of severe propriety, dropped her hands by her side, and
with an affected conscientiousness walked on, a little further from
Clarence's side, until they reached the ice-cream saloon.

"Get a table near the back, Clarence," she said, in a confidential
whisper, "where they can't see us--and strawberry, you know, for the
lemon and vanilla here are just horrid!"

They took their seats in a kind of rustic arbor in the rear of the shop,
which gave them the appearance of two youthful but somewhat over-dressed
and over-conscious shepherds. There was an interval of slight
awkwardness, which Susy endeavored to displace. "There has been," she
remarked, with easy conversational lightness, "quite an excitement about
our French teacher being changed. The girls in our class think it most
disgraceful."

And this was all she could say after a separation of four years!
Clarence was desperate, but as yet idealess and voiceless. At last, with
an effort over his spoon, he gasped a floating recollection: "Do you
still like flapjacks, Susy?"

"Oh, yes," with a laugh, "but we don't have them now."

"And Mose" (a black pointer, who used to yelp when Susy sang), "does he
still sing with you?"

"Oh, HE'S been lost ever so long," said Susy composedly; "but I've got
a Newfoundland and a spaniel and a black pony;" and here, with a rapid
inventory of her other personal effects, she drifted into some desultory