My! you’re prettier than ever! Well, I just had to come. I couldn’t resist, when I heard of your engagement. Where’s the man? Show him to me at once!”

“Oh, he isn’t here, for the moment. But you’ll see him soon. I’m only afraid you’ll cut me out. Why, Bumble,—Helen, I mean, you’re utterly changed from the little girl I remember.”

“Of course I am—in appearance,—but no other way.”

“Are you still the happy-go-lucky, hit-or-miss little rascal you used to be?”

“Of course I am. Oh, Patty, doesn’t it seem long ago that you spent that summer with us? And to think I’ve scarcely seen you since! Not since Nan’s wedding, anyway.”

“No; and you only in Philadelphia! It’s ridiculous. But, I’ve tried to get you over here time and again.”

“I know it. But I went out West to Stanford, and I was there so long, I almost lost track of all my Eastern people. Your Best Beloved is Western, isn’t he? Oh, Patty, tell me all,—everything about him.”

“All in good time, Helen, honey. For now, I’ll just say that he’s the dearest and best man in the whole world, and that you’ll agree to that when you see him. Now, come up to your room, and fix yourself up. You look as if you’d been through a whirlwind!”

“I always look like that,” and Helen Barlow laughed.

She was Patty’s cousin, and had come to New York for a visit. She had often been invited and several times had planned to come, but something had prevented her, and as the Barlow family were of a most undependable sort in the matter of keeping engagements or appointments, it surprised nobody that Helen had not carried out her plans. Indeed the surprise was that she was really here at last, and Patty stared at her hard to reassure herself that her guest had positively appeared.

Helen Barlow was a pretty girl, about Patty’s own age. Her soft brown hair was curled round her ears, in the prevailing mode, but it showed various wisps out of place, and needed certain pats and adjustments before a mirror. Her hat, a brown velvet toque, was a little askew,—even more so than she meant it to be,—and the long fur stole, over her arm, dragged on the floor.

Without being positively unkempt, Helen was untidy, and Patty well remembered that as a child she had been far more so.

The two girls went up to the room prepared for Helen, and soon her outer garments went flying. The hat was tossed on the bed, upside down; the stole slipped to the floor as the long cloth coat was wrenched open and one button pulled off by an impatient twitch.

“Never mind,” Helen said, “that old button was loose, anyway. Oh, Patty, how trim and tidy you look!”

It was second nature to Patty to be well groomed, and she would have been sadly uncomfortable with a button missing or a ribbon awry, unless intentionally so. For Patty was no prim young person, but she was by no means untidy.

She laughed at her cousin’s impetuous ways, and picked up the scattered garments, as fast as Helen flung them down.

“Don’t you have a maid, Patty? I supposed of course you did.”

“Oh, we have Jane. She maids Nan and me both, when we want her. But she does a lot of other things, too. We don’t have as many servants as we used to. Patriotism has struck this house, you know, and we’ve cut out more or less of the luxuries.”

“Good for you! I’m patriotic, too. Do you knit?”

“Of course; who doesn’t? Now, Bumble,—oh, yes, I’m going to call you by the old name if I want to,—do try to make yourself look tidy! Take down your hair and do it over. Your hair is lovely,—if you’d take a little more pains with it.”

“To be sure! Anything to please!” and Helen shook down her short curly mop. “Let me see his picture,” she demanded as she brushed vigorously away. “Quick! quick! I can’t wait a minute!”

Patty ran out of the room, laughing, and returned with a photograph of Farnsworth.

“Stunning!” cried Helen, “he’s simply great! Wherever did you catch him? Are there any more at home like him? ’Deed I will steal him away from you, if I possibly can. Oh, Patty, do you remember Chester Wilde? Well, he wants me to marry him, but I can’t see it! That’s one reason I ran away from home, to escape his persistence.”

“I do believe you’re a belle, Bumble! You’re fascinating, I see. Mercy goodness, you’ll cut poor little me out with everybody!”

“As if you cared! Now that you’re wooed and won!”

“Of course I don’t care. You can have all the others,—and there are plenty,—only, so many of them are going or gone to war.”

“I know, all my best ones have, too. But you couldn’t like a man who doesn’t want to fight!”

“I should say nixy!”

“What’s your Bill do? Is he in camp?”

“Oh, no. You know, he’s an expert mining engineer, and he’s used,—I mean, his services are used by the government. I can’t tell you all about it, because I don’t know all myself; and what I do know, I’m not allowed to tell, in detail. So don’t ask, Helen; just know my little Billee is doing his full duty,—and then some!”

“Little! Is he little? He doesn’t look so, from this picture.”

The photograph showed only the head and shoulders of Farnsworth, but it hinted a large man. However, Patty said, just for fun:

“You can’t tell from that. But I don’t mind how little he is,—he’s all the world to me!”

She looked a trifle embarrassed, so, thinking Farnsworth must be decidedly undersized, Helen dropped the subject.

Her trunk had arrived, and Jane appeared, to assist in unpacking.

“Get out a pretty frock,” Patty directed her guest, “and I’ll help you get into it, and then we’ll go down and see Nan, she’ll soon be home.”

“Where is she?”

“Chasing some committee, as usual. We’ve both lost our individuality now, and we’re merged in committees. I’m a member of quite a number, but Nan belongs to more than I do. Here, Helen, put on this bluet, Georgette, satinet thing.”

“Rather dressy?”

“Not too much so. It’s nearly tea time, and people often drop in and I want you to make a good impression. And for gracious’ sake, do your hair more carefully than that! Here, let me do it,—or Jane.”

“All right,” and Helen dropped into a chair before the toilette table, while the deft and willing Jane quickly twisted up the brown locks.

“Now you’ll do,” said Patty, after a final critical examination. “Oh, wait, this sash end is loose.”

“I know, the snapper’s off. Never mind.”

“But I do mind! Helen Barlow, you’re as bumbly as ever! We used to call you that because you were as heedless and careless as a bumblebee——”

“There was another reason,” Helen laughed.

“Yes, because you were so fat! You’ve pretty nearly gotten over that.”

“Thank you, lady, for dem kind woids! A little guarded, aren’t you? Know then, that my sole end, aim and ambition is to get thin, really thin,—slim, slender, willowy,—merely a slip of a girl——”

“You haven’t quite achieved all that!” and Patty laughed. “But if you’re trying to, I’ll help you. No sweets, you know.”

“Gracious, Patty, I haven’t tasted candy for two years! And as a sugar conserver, I’m right there! Not a lump of it comes my way!”

“Good for you! Then, with exercise, and not too much sleep, we’ll soon get you into