“Is that so?  Well, I don’t wonder.  It certainly looks great—­on you.”

Madame flushed and turned her face to look off through the plate glass door.  “Why,” she exclaimed, “you didn’t tell me your new automobile had come.”  She moved a few steps, sweeping the car with admiring eyes.  “Isn’t it luxurious though, and smart?  But you deserve it; you deserve everything that’s coming to you now, staying here, sticking it out as you have in the heat and sand.  I often thought of it summer days while I was over on the Sound.”

“You did?” questioned Bailey in pleased surprise.  “Well, I am glad to know that.  I wonder whether you ever thought over the time we tramped the railroad ties up to Leavenworth to that little dance?”

“Often,” she responded quickly.  “And how we came back in the Oleson wagon, riding behind with our heels hanging over, and the dust settling like powder on our party clothes.  But I had the loveliest time.  It was the starriest night, with moonlight coming home, and I danced every number.”

“Seven times with me,” returned the mayor.

“I wanted to learn the two-step,” she explained hastily.

“And I wanted to teach you,” he laughed.  “But say, how would you like to take a little spin up the Leavenworth road this evening, in the new car?”

“Oh, that would be delightful.”  Madame Lucile glowed.  “With a party?” she asked.

“Well, I thought of asking Daniels and his wife to go with us.  I am on the way to the station now, to meet them.  And Mrs. Weatherbee and Miss Morganstein are due on the same train.  I promised Mr. Banks I would take them out to the Orchards in the machine; but we are to motor around to the new bungalow first, to leave the bride and Jimmie and have luncheon.”

“I know.  Mrs. Banks is going to have the table in that wide veranda looking down the river.  I would like to be there when they find out that dear little bungalow is their wedding present.  It was perfectly lovely of Mrs. Banks to think of it; and of you to give them that beautiful lot on the point.  You can see Hesperides Vale for miles and miles to the lower gap.”

Bailey smiled.  “Mrs. Banks said it was a good way to use up the lumber that was left over from the ranch house.  And that bungalow certainly makes a great showing for the town.  It raised the value of the adjoining lots.  I sold three before the shingles were on the walls, and the people who bought them thought they had a snap.”

“All the same, it is a lovely present,” said Madame Lucile.

“There’s the train, whistling up the valley,” said the mayor, but he paused to ask, almost with diffidence, as he turned to the door:  “Say, what do you think of this tie?”

“I like it.”  She nodded, with a reassuring smile.  “And it’s a nice shade for you; it brings out the blue in your eyes.”

The mayor laughed gaily.  “I ought to wear it steady after that, but I am coming to black ones with a frock coat and silk hat.  I am going to begin to-morrow, when those German scientists, on their way home from the Orient, stop to see Hesperides Vale.”