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 grow up I am going to be a dancer like the Esmeralda myself. I'm working hard at it."

"That's ripping," said Ronald in a tone of the warmest approval.

But he could not properly discuss a matter of such weight while he was in motion, and at the bottom of the stairs he came to a standstill and gazed at her earnestly.

"So you've really been on the stage?" he said, knitting his brows into a thoughtful frown. "I tell you what: ever since you were at the court I've been thinking that you're the kind of a girl I should like to marry. In fact, you're the only girl I ever felt like that about. But when I found you were John Ruffin's housekeeper I was a good deal put off—"

"It's a position of dignity. He said so," Pollyooly interrupted in a very firm tone.

"Yes; but fellows don't marry housekeepers. But if you're going on the stage—dancing, too—that makes it all right. Lots of fellows marry girls on the stage—in the choruses of musical comedy—"

"They can't dance for nuts," interrupted