“‘Connie,’ he said, ’I am sorry to interrupt, but I need to talk to you a few minutes.  It is a matter of business.’  To Buddy he said, ’You know Connie always helps me out when I get stuck.  Can you give me a minute, Connie?’

“I said, ’Of course I can.  You’ll excuse me won’t you, Buddy?  It is getting late anyhow.’

“So Buddy went away and Dan marched we up on the porch where it was dark and shady.

“‘Are you engaged to Buddy Johnson?’

“‘No.’

“‘Thank Heaven.’

“Dan kissed me, regardless of the accusing eyes of my husband in the background.”

Carol breathed loudly in her relief.  He kissed her.  Connie did not care.  They were engaged.

“Dan breathlessly took back everything he ever said about getting married, and being a bachelor, and so forth.  He said he was crazy to be married, always had been, but didn’t find it out before.  He said he had always adored me.  And I drew out my note-book, and showed him the first page,—­Doctor Daniel Brooks, O. K. And every other name in the book was checked off.

“Dan was jubilant.”  Connie’s voice trailed away slowly, and her earnest fine eyes were cloudy.

“An engagement,” cried Carol, springing up.

“No,” said Connie slowly, “a blunder.”

“A blunder,” faltered Carol, falling back.  “You did it on purpose to make him propose, didn’t you?”

“Yes, and he proposed, and we were engaged.  But it was just a blunder.  It was not Dan I wanted.  Carol, every woman feels like that at times.  She is full of that great magnificent ideal of home, and husband, and little children.  It seems the finest thing in the world, the only flawless life.  She can’t resist it, for the time being.  She feels that work is silly, that success is tawdry, that ambition is wicked.  It is dangerous, Carol, for if she gets the opportunity, or if she can make the opportunity, she is pretty sure to seize it.  I believe that is why so many marriages are unhappy,—­girls mistake that natural woman-wish for love, and they get married, and then—­shipwreck.”

Carol sat silent.

“Yes,” said David sympathetically, “I think you are right.  You were lucky to escape.”

“I knew that evening, that one little evening of our engagement, that having a home and a husband, and even a little child like Julia, would never be enough.  Something else had to come first.  And it had not come.  I went to bed and cried all night, so sorry for Dan for I knew he loved me,—­but not sorry enough to make me do him such a cruel injustice.  The next morning I told him, and that afternoon I returned to Chicago.

“I have thought a whole lot more of my job since then.”

“But why couldn’t you love him?” asked Carol impatiently.  “It seems unreasonable, Connie.  He is nice enough for anybody, and you were just ripe and ready for it.”

Connie shrugged her shoulders.  “Why didn’t you love somebody else besides David?” she asked, and laughed at the quick resentment that flashed to Carol’s eyes.