Van Landing turned sharply.  The door was open, though he had not heard the knock, and with a spring Carmencita was beside him, holding his hands and dancing as if demented with a joy no longer to be held in restraint.

“Oh, Mr. Van, I’ve almost died for fear I wouldn’t find you in time!  And you’re here at Mother McNeil’s, and all yesterday I looked and looked, and I couldn’t remember your last name, and neither could Father.  And Miss Frances was away until night, and I never prayed so hard and looked so hard in my life!  Oh, Mr. Van, if you are a stranger, I love you, and I’m so glad you’re found!”

She stopped for breath, and Van Landing, stooping, lifted Carmencita’s face and kissed it.

“You are my dear friend, Carmencita.”  His voice, as his hands, was a bit shaky.  “I, too, am very glad—­and grateful.  Will you ask her to come, ask her to let me see her?  I cannot wait any longer.”

“You’ll have to.”  Carmencita’s eyes were big and blue in sudden seriousness.  “The Little Big Sisters have their tree to-night, and she’s got a million trillion things to do to-day, and she’s gone out.  She’s awful glad you’re better, though.  I asked her, and she said she was.  And I asked her why she didn’t marry you right straight away, or to-morrow if she didn’t have time to-day, and—­”

“You did what, Carmencita?”

“That.  I asked her that.  What’s the use of wasting time?  I told her you’d like a wife for a Christmas gift very much, if she was the wife.  Wouldn’t you?  Wouldn’t you really and truly rather have her than anything else?”

Van Landing turned and looked out of the window.  The child’s eyes and earnest, eager face could not be met in the surge of hot blood which swept over him, and his throat grew tight.  All his theories and ideas were becoming but confused upheaval in the manipulations of fate, or what you will, that were bringing strange things to pass, and he no longer could think clearly or feel calmly.  He must get away before he saw Frances.

“Wouldn’t you, Mr. Van?”

In the voice beside him was shy entreaty and appeal, and, hands clasped behind her, Carmencita waited.

“I would.”  Van Landing made effort to smile, but in his eyes was no smiling.  Into them had come sudden purpose.  “I shall ask her to marry me to-morrow.”

Arms extended to the limit of their length, Carmencita whirled round and round the room, then, breathless, stopped and, taking Van Landing’s hand, lifted it to her lips.

“I kiss your hand, my lord, and bring you greetings from your faithful subjects!  I read that in a book.  I’ll be the subject.  Isn’t it grand and magnificent and glorious?” She stopped.  “She hasn’t any new clothes.  A lady can’t get married without new clothes, can she?  And she won’t have time to get any on Christmas eve.  Whether she’ll do it or not, you’ll have to make her, Mr. Van, or you’ll lose her again.  You’ve—­got—­to—­just—­make—­her!”