"It may be the best thing for you in the end—like being allowed to smoke a cigar when you were a youngster or eat too many cookies or raisins on the principle that a surfeit cures. Anyway there's my hand, and you can count on me.
She took it and looked him in the eyes with a boy's frankness while he continued:
"And whether you come back in one month or twelve, you'll find me waiting and loving you just the same. Will you remember that, Nan—just the same?"
"I'll remember. And Bob," with a little catch in her voice, "you surely are white folks!"
Flinging aside the magazine which had not been able to hold her attention. Nan raised herself from the depths of the great armchair in her little sitting-room and trailed a yellow silk negligee to the window.
"Only one night more, thank goodness!" she said aloud, "I feel like a matricide and a patricide, and all the other 'cides there are, with mother and Elsie bursting into tears every time they see me. They simply cannot
