“We can,” said Margaret, demurely.

“We will!” said Chad, and he made for a door, outside which lanterns were swinging in the wind.  Margaret caught up some flimsy garment and wound it about her pretty round throat—­they call it a “fascinator” in the South.

Chad looked down at her.

“I wish you could see yourself; I wish I could tell you how you look.”

“I have,” said Margaret, “every time I passed a mirror.  And other people have told me.  Mr. Hunt did.  He didn’t seem to have much trouble.”

“I wish I had his tongue.”

“If you had, and nothing else, you wouldn’t have me”—­Chad started as the little witch paused a second, drawling—­“leaving my friends and this jolly dance to go out into a freezing yard and talk to an aged Colonial who doesn’t appreciate his modern blessings.  The next thing you’ll be wanting, I suppose—­will be—­”

“You, Margaret; you—­you!”

It had come at last and Margaret hardly knew the choked voice that interrupted her.  She had turned her back to him to sit down.  She paused a moment, standing.  Her eyes closed; a slight tremor ran through her, and she sank with her face in her hands.  Chad stood silent, trembling.  Voices murmured about them, but like the music in the house, they seemed strangely far away.  The stirring of the wind made the sudden damp on his forehead icy-cold.  Margaret’s hands slowly left her face, which had changed as by a miracle.  Every trace of coquetry was gone.  It was the face of a woman who knew her own heart, and had the sweet frankness to speak it, that was lifted now to Chad.

“I’m so glad you are what you are, Chad; but had you been otherwise—­that would have made no difference to me.  You believe that, don’t you, Chad?  They might not have let me marry you, but I should have cared, just the same.  They may not now, but that, too, will make no difference.”  She turned her eyes from his for an instant, as though she were looking far backward.  “Ever since that day,” she said, slowly, “when I heard you say, ’Tell the little gurl I didn’t mean nothin’ callin’ her a little gal’”—­there was a low, delicious gurgle in the throat as she tried to imitate his odd speech, and then her eyes suddenly filled with tears, but she brushed them away, smiling brightly.  “Ever since then, Chad—­” she stopped—­a shadow fell across the door of the little summer house.

“Here I am, Mr. Hunt,” she said, lightly; “is this your dance?” She rose and was gone.  “Thank you, Mr. Buford,” she called back, sweetly.

For a moment Chad stood where he was, quite dazed—­so quickly, so unexpectedly had the crisis come.  The blood had rushed to his face and flooded him with triumphant happiness.  A terrible doubt chilled him as quickly.  Had he heard aright?—­could he have misunderstood her?  Had the dream of years really come true?  What was it she had said?  He stumbled around in the half darkness, wondering.  Was this another phase of her unceasing coquetry?  How quickly her tone had changed when Richard Hunt’s shadow came.  At that moment, he neither could nor would have changed a hair had some genie dropped them both in the midst of the crowded ball-room.  He turned swiftly toward the dancers.  He must see, know—­now!