From the blue sea, now and then, came the breath of Winter, though Autumn lingered on the shore.  Many of the people at the hotel had gone back to town, feeling the imperious call of the city with the first keen wind.  Eloise, with a few others, waited.  She expected to stay until Barbara was strong enough to go with her.

But Barbara’s strength was coming very slowly now.  She grieved for her father, and the grieving kept her back.  Allan came down once a fortnight to spend Sunday with Eloise and to look after Barbara, though he realised that Barbara was, in a way, beyond his reach.

[Sidenote:  What We Need]

“She doesn’t need medicine,” he said, to Eloise.  “She is perfectly well, physically, though of course her strength is limited and will be for some time to come.  What she needs is happiness.”

“That is what we all need,” answered Eloise.

Allan flashed a quick glance at her.  “Even I,” he said, in a different tone, “but I must wait for mine.”

“We all wait for things,” she laughed, but the lovely colour had mounted to the roots of her hair that waved so softly back from her low forehead.

“When, dear?” insisted Allan, possessing himself of her hand.

“I promised once,” she answered.  “When the colour is all gone from the hills and the last leaves have fallen, then I’ll come.”

“You’re not counting the oaks?” he asked, half fearfully.  “Sometimes the oak leaves stay on all Winter, you know.  And evergreens are ruled out, aren’t they?”

“Certainly.  We won’t count the oaks or the Christmas trees.  Long before Santa Claus comes, I’ll be a sedate matron instead of a flyaway, frivolous spinster.”

“For the first time since I grew up,” remarked Allan, with evident sincerity, “I wish Christmas came earlier.  Upon what day, fair lady, do you think the leaves will be gone?”

“In November, I suppose,” she answered, with an affected indifference that did not deceive him.  “The day after Thanksgiving, perhaps.”

“That’s Friday, and I positively refuse to be married on a Friday.”

[Sidenote:  The Best Day of All]

“Then the day before—­that’s Wednesday.  You know the old rhyme says:  ‘Wednesday the best day of all.’”

So it was settled.  Allan laughingly put down in his little red leather pocket diary, under the date of Wednesday, November twenty-fifth, “Miss Wynne’s wedding.”  “Where is it to be?” he asked.  “I wouldn’t miss it for worlds.”

“I’ve been thinking about that,” said Eloise, slowly, after a pause.  “I suppose we’ll have to be conventional.”

“Why?”

“Because everybody is.”

“The very reason why we shouldn’t be.  This is our wedding, and we’ll have it to please ourselves.  It’s probably our last.”

“In spite of the advanced civilisation in which we live,” she returned, “I hope and believe that it is the one and only wedding in which either of us will ever take a leading part.”