“I congratulate Miss Pasmer,” said Eunice, “on securing such a very reasonable husband.”

When Eunice first became a young lady she was so much older than Dan that in his mother’s absence she sometimes authorised herself to box his ears, till she was finally overthrown in battle by the growing boy.  She still felt herself so much his tutelary genius that she could not let the idea of his engagement awe her, or keep her from giving him a needed lesson.  Dan jumped to his feet, and passionately threw his napkin on his chair.

“There, that will do, Eunice!” interposed the father.  “Sit down, Dan, and don’t be an ass, if you are engaged.  Do you expect to come up here with a bombshell in your pocket, and explode it among us without causing any commotion?  We all desire your happiness, and we are glad if you think you’ve found it, but we want to have time to realise it.  We had only adjusted our minds to the apparent fact that you hadn’t found it when you were here before.”  His father began very severely, but when he ended with this recognition of what they had all blinked till then, they laughed together.

“My pillow isn’t dry yet, with the tears I shed for you, Dan,” said Minnie demurely.

“I shall have to countermand my mourning,” said Eunice, “and wear louder colours than ever.  Unless,” she added, “Miss Pasmer changes her mind again.”

This divination of the past gave them all a chance for another laugh, and Dan’s sisters began to reconcile themselves to the fact of his engagement, if not to Miss Pasmer.  In what was abstractly so disagreeable there was the comfort that they could joke about his happiness; they had not felt free to make light of his misery when he was at home before.  They began to ask all the questions they could think of as to how and when, and they assimilated the fact more and more in acquiring these particulars and making a mock of them and him.

“Of course you haven’t got her photograph,” suggested Eunice.  “You know we’ve never had the pleasure of meeting the young lady yet.”

“Yes,” Dan owned, blushing, “I have.  She thought I might like to show it to mother:  But it isn’t—­”

“A very good one—­they never are,” said Minnie.

“And it was taken several years ago—­they always are,” said Eunice.

“And she doesn’t photograph well, anyway.”

“And this one was just after a long fit of sickness.”

Dan drew it out of his pocket, after some fumbling for it, while he tolerated their gibes.

Eunice put her nose to it.  “I hope it’s your cigarettes it smells of,” she said.

“Yes; she doesn’t use the weed,” answered Dan.

“Oh, I didn’t mean that, exactly,” returned his sister, holding the picture off at arm’s length, and viewing it critically with contracted eyes.

Dan could not help laughing.  “I don’t think it’s been near any other cigar-case,” he answered tranquilly.