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 minute-ago defiance of fear of physical possession, Dave satisfied himself now with switching on the light again to see her face—the clear, dear line of her forehead and nose, the soft dark brown of her hair and the blueness of her eyes always open to his. She had lovely eyes and so loyal looking—unswervingly loyal to him, indeed, ever since that day, long ago, when they rested on his in a way he would never forget and she said: "We're going to be good friends forever, aren't we, you and I?"

That made one of their marker days about which they liked often to speak and which often came to him when he suddenly looked down at her and found her gazing at him, as she was now, certain of herself being his and wondering, in just this way, how wholly he was hers.

"Hello," he said to her, and smiled.

"Hello," she said; and he threw in the gear and sent the car forward.

"Plenty of snow," he remarked as the wheels slipped. "We'll not be home in a hurry."

"I'm not in a hurry now, Davey."

"Nor I. But you were before?"

"When I knew you would be down here and after I hadn't seen you for two days! Of course! And you'd come early, I thought; you were here before you said you'd be, weren't you?"

"Yes; for then I thought you'd come out early."

"Oh, Davy, I would have, but to-night—" she stopped. She had forgotten Fidelia Netley in her meeting with David. Now that she remembered the new girl, she thought how senseless had been her pang