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186 “Bring on your paragon,” laughed Frank Muir. “It passes my comprehension how any woman can manage to keep small boys in order,  but I’ll take your word for it.”

But when he rose to meet Bess as she came into the parlor, he felt at once that she might  easily deserve his friend’s praise, and that her pleasant, cordial manner would win the heart of  the most cross-grained little urchin in existence. He was rather critical in his judgment of young women, perhaps because they usually courted  his attentions in a most unblushing fashion;  but this one was quite to his taste, and he  settled himself for a long, enjoyable call, exerting himself to be as entertaining as possible,  while the rector sat by, reflecting how well they  were suited to each other.

But as Bessie sat there, talking so easily of one thing and another, with a frank pleasure in the young man’s society, she gradually became conscious of the fact that her hair was fast  slipping from its usual smooth coils on top of  her head, and dropping towards her neck. Cautiously putting up her hand to investigate the cause, she discovered that, of the four long