“Bob Worthington came to see me last week, and he wants to come again.  He lives in Brampton,” Cynthia explained, “and is at Harvard College.”

Mrs. Merrill was decidedly surprised.  She went on with her sewing, however, and did not betray the fact.  She knew of Dudley Worthington as one of the richest and most important men in his state; she had heard her husband speak of him often; but she had never meddled with politics and railroad affairs.

“By all means let him come, Cynthia,” she replied.

When Mr. Merrill got home that evening she spoke of the matter to him.

“Cynthia is a strange character,” she said.  “Sometimes I can’t understand her—­she seems so much older than our girls, Stephen.  Think of her keeping this to herself for four days!”

Mr. Merrill laughed, but he went off to a little writing room he had and sat for a long time looking into the glowing coals.  Then he laughed again.  Mr. Merrill was a philosopher.  After all, he could not forbid Dudley Worthington’s son coming to his house, nor did he wish to.

That same evening Cynthia wrote a letter and posted it.  She found it a very difficult letter to write, and almost as difficult to drop into the mail-box.  She reflected that the holidays were close at hand, and then he would go to Brampton and forget, even as he had forgotten before.  And she determined when Wednesday afternoon came around that she would take a long walk in the direction of Brookline.  Cynthia loved these walks, for she sadly missed the country air,—­and they had kept the color in her cheeks and the courage in her heart that winter.  She had amazed the Merrill girls by the distances she covered, and on more than one occasion she had trudged many miles to a spot from which there was a view of Blue Hills.  They reminded her faintly of Coniston.

Who can speak or write with any certainty of the feminine character, or declare what unexpected twists perversity and curiosity may give to it?  Wednesday afternoon came, and Cynthia did not go to Brookline.  She put on her coat, and took it off again.  Would he dare to come in the face of the mandate he had received?  If he did come, she wouldn’t see him.  Ellen had received her orders.

At four o’clock the doorbell rang, and shortly thereafter Ellen appeared, simpering and apologetic enough, with a card.  She had taken the trouble to read it this time.  Cynthia was angry, or thought she was, and her cheeks were very red.

“I told you to excuse me, Ellen.  Why did you let him in?”

“Miss Cynthia, darlin’,” said Ellen, “if it was made of flint I was, wouldn’t he bring the tears out of me with his wheedlin’ an’ coaxin’?  An’ him such a fine young gintleman!  And whin he took to commandin’ like, sure I couldn’t say no to him at all at all.  ’Take the card to her, Ellen,’ he says—­didn’t he know me name!—­’an’ if she says she won’t see me, thin I won’t trouble her more.’  Thim were his words, Miss.”