But of all this, of course, Prescott was wholly unaware.

“How much time have we to spare?” queried Dick, then glancing at his watch.  “Ten minutes.  Laura, will you stroll around the Hall with me and look down over the cliff at the noble old Hudson!  This will be one of my last glimpses as a cadet.”

Laura assented.  Greg was about to follow, when Belle Meade drew him back.

“Take me inside,” she urged.  “I am eager to see the decorations.”

“But Dick and Laura?” queried Greg.

“They’re of age and can take care of themselves,” smiled Miss Meade.

Dick Prescott’s heart was beating, now, like a trip-hammer.  Even the next day’s graduation, and the entrance into the Army looked insignificant to him compared with the question of his fate that was now seething in his brain and which he must now have settled.

Two or three times he opened his lips to speak, then closed them, as the two young people stood glancing down at the river through the darkness.

“Aren’t you unusually silent, Dick?” asked Laura.

“Perhaps so,” he assented in a low voice.  “I’m scared.”

“Scared!”

“Yes; scared cold.  I never knew such a fright in my life before.”

“Why, what-----”

“Laura, I reckon the brief, direct way of the soldier will be best.  Laura, ever since we were in High School together I have loved you.  Through all the years that have followed, that love has never slumbered for an instant.  It has grown stronger with every passing \ week.  I-----”

With a little cry Laura Bentley drew back.

“I’m going right through to the end,” cried Dick desperately.  “Then you can throw cold water over me—–­if you must.  Laura, I love you, and that love is nearly all of my life!  I ask you to become a soldier’s bride—–­mine!”

“And—–­and—–­is that what has scared you?” asked Laura in a very low voice.

“Yes!”

“What a pitiful coward you are, then, to be a candidate for a commission in the Army,” laughed Laura Bentley softly.

“But you—–­you haven’t answered me.”

“Why, Dick, I’ve never had another thought, in six years, than that I loved you!”

“Laura!  You love me?”

“Why, of course, Dick.  What has ailed your eyes and your reasoning powers?”

With a glad cry, Prescott gathered his betrothed in his arms, claiming a lover’s privilege.

Then out of an inner pocket he drew a little box, drew out a circlet of gold in which a solitaire glistened, and slipped the ring over the finger set apart for the purpose of wearing such pledges.

“And how soon, Laura—–­sweetheart?” he demanded eagerly.

“Now, as to that, you must act like a creature of reason,” Laura laughingly insisted.  “You are not yet in the Army.  At first, after you do receive your commission, you must be saving and careful.  It needs furniture and all those things, you see, Dick, dearest, to form the background of a home.  We must wait a little while—–­but what sweet waiting it will be!”