But if she was beautiful when flushed and cross and sticky, there
was no word for her when she presently came demurely downstairs,
her exquisite little red mouth still pouting, her bright head
still drooping sulkily, but her wonderful eyes glinting mischief,
and the dark, tumbled apron replaced by thin white ruffles that
began at Cherry's shoulders and ended above her ankles. Soft, firm
round chin, straight little nose, blue eyes ringed with babyish
shadows; Martin found them all adorable, as was every inch of the
slender, beautifully made little body, the brown warm hand, the
clear, childish forehead, the square little foot in a shining
slipper.

Her eighteenth birthday! He learned that she had just put up her
hair, indeed, after dinner, her father made her tumble it down in
a golden mop again. "Can't lose my last girl, you know," he said
to Mrs. North, Martin's aunt, seriously. Martin had been shown her
birthday gifts: books and a silver belt buckle and a gold pen and
stationery and handkerchiefs. A day or two later she had had
another gift; had opened the tiny Shreve box with a sudden
hammering at her heart, with a presage of delight. She had found a
silver-topped candy jar, and the card of Mr. John Martin Lloyd,
and under the name, in tiny letters, the words "O fudge!" The
girls laughed over this nonsense appreciatively, but there was
more than laughter in Cherry's heart.

From that moment the world was changed. Her father, her sister,
her cousin had second place, now. Cherry had put out her innocent
little hand, and had opened the gate, and had passed through it
into the world. That hour was the beginning, and it had led her