His laughing eyes looked down at her.  She shook her head.  “If I came up the tree I should prove that I am still a girl.  If I am still a girl—­”

“Are you still a girl?  Is that still your greatest desire?” He leaned forward, and the smile suddenly left his lips.  His eyes searched hers.

The face she bravely lifted to him was a girl’s for youthful beauty, but into it had come something very sweet and womanly, which at last gave him the leave he had waited so long for.  “No—­I think I’ve grown up.” she said, quite clearly.

With an exclamation, the sinewy figure in the tree made short work of the ten feet to the ground, swinging itself off from the limb by both hands and dropping lightly down.

“I don’t think I could have waited a day longer,” said Jarvis Burnside.  Then, with the sheltering trunk of the great oak shutting off all possible vision from the far distant house, he drew Sally Lane into his eager arms.

* * * * *

“Why so late?” Maxwell Lane looked up to ask, as his sister Sally came somewhat hurriedly in to dinner, when the rest of the household were half through.

“Please excuse my pink gingham,” apologized Sally, as she dropped into her chair.  She glanced from Mrs. Burnside in cool white to Josephine in crisp blue.

“Nothing could be more becoming,” Josephine asserted, always ready to defend her friend.

“There’s a strawberry stain on her right sleeve,” Bob pointed out.

“Where’s Jarve?” asked Alec.

“I saw him as I came in.  He was on his way,” replied Sally, lifting a glass of water to hide a pair of lips which wanted to laugh.

Jarvis appeared.  He also was in the garb be had worn all day.  The pair seemed oddly similar in the nonchalance they could not quite successfully carry through.

“Look here!” Alec scanned both faces.  “You two have been up to something.”

“I’ve been up a tree,” Jarvis replied.

“Have you been up a tree too?” Alec questioned his sister.

“Not at all.”

“Did you get him up one?”

Sally attempted to answer, but the merriment upon her lips would not be controlled.  She gave way to it.  Her eyes, in spite of themselves, met Jarvis’s.  He was laughing too.  His face, red showing beneath the tan, was too radiant with his happiness for him to be able to help Sally with any further effort at concealment.

“Don’t you think we may as well own up?” he questioned her.

“Own up!” cried Alec.  “Do you people flatter yourselves there’s anything for you to own up to, that we don’t already know?”

“Good for you!” And Max rose up to shake Jarvis’s hand.

“It’s nothing new, but it’s great!” roared Bob, and patted his sister’s shoulder.

“My dear!” said Mrs. Burnside.  She rose, and Sally ran to her.  Josephine followed eagerly, pausing to embrace her brother on the way.