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south in two lines of houses that seemed to meet in the distance, hemmed her in. She had been born in the little brick house, and, as she was of it, so it was of her. Her hands had smoothed and painted the pine floors; her hands had put up the twine on which the morning-glories in the yard covered the fences; had, indeed, with what agonies of slacking lime and adding blueing, whitewashed the fence itself!
"She's capable," Aunt Harriet had grumblingly admitted, watching from her sewing-machine Sidney's strong young arms at this humble spring task.
"She's wonderful!" her mother had said, as she bent over her hand work. She was not strong enough to run the sewing-machine.
So Joe Drummond stood on the pavement and saw his dream of taking Sidney in his arms fade into an indefinite futurity.
"I'm not going to give you up," he said doggedly. "When you come back, I'll be waiting."
The shock being over, and things only postponed, he dramatized his grief a trifle, thrust his hands savagely into his pockets, and scowled down the Street. In the line of his vision, his quick eye caught a tiny moving shadow, lost it, found it again.
"Great Scott! There goes Reginald!" he cried, and ran after the shadow. "Watch for the McKees' cat!"
Sidney was running by that time; they were gaining. Their quarry, a four-inch chipmunk, hesitated, gave a protesting squeak, and was caught in Sidney's hand.
"You wretch!" she cried. "You miserable little beast--with cats everywhere, and not a nut for miles!"
"That reminds me,"--Joe put a hand into his pocket,--"I brought some chestnuts for him, and forgot them. Here."
Reginald's escape had rather knocked the tragedy out of the evening. True, Sidney would not marry him for years, but she had practically promised to sometime. And when one is twenty-one, and it is a summer night, and life stretches eternities ahead, what are a few years more or less?
Sidney was holding the tiny squirrel in warm, protecting hands. She smiled up at the boy.
"Good-night, Joe."
"Good-night. I say, Sidney, it's more than half an engagement. Won't you kiss me good-night?"
She hesitated, flushed and palpitating. Kisses were rare in the staid little household to which she belonged.
"I--I think not."
"Please! I'm not very happy, and it will be something to remember."
Perhaps, after all, Sidney's first kiss would have gone without her heart,--which was a thing she had determined would never happen,--gone out of sheer pity. But a tall figure loomed out of the shadows and approached with quick strides.
"The roomer!" cried Sidney, and backed away.
"Damn the roomer!"
Poor Joe, with the summer evening quite spoiled, with no caress to remember, and with a potential rival who possessed both the years and the inches he lacked, coming up the Street!
The roomer advanced steadily. When he reached the doorstep, Sidney was demurely seated and quite alone. The roomer, who had walked fast, stopped and took off his hat. He looked very warm. He carried a suitcase, which was as it should be. The men of the Street always carried their own luggage, except the younger Wilson across the way. His tastes were known to be luxurious.
"Hot, isn't it?" Sidney inquired, after a formal greeting. She indicated the place on the step just vacated by Joe. "You'd better cool off out here. The house is like an oven. I think I should have warned you of that before you took the room. These little houses with low roofs are fearfully hot."
The new roomer hesitated. The steps were very low, and he was tall. Besides, he did not care to establish any relations with the people in the house. Long evenings in which to read, quiet nights in which to sleep and forget--these were the things he had come for.
But Sidney had moved over and was smiling up at him. He folded up awkwardly on the low step. He seemed much too big for the house. Sidney had a panicky thought of the little room upstairs.
"I don't mind heat. I--I suppose I don't think about it," said the roomer, rather surprised at himself.
Reginald, having finished his chestnut, squeaked for another. The roomer started.
"Just Reginald--my ground-squirrel." Sidney was skinning a nut with her strong white teeth. "That's another thing I should have told you. I'm afraid you'll be sorry you took the room."
The roomer smiled in the shadow.
"I'm beginning to think that YOU are sorry."
She was all anxiety to reassure him:--
"It's because of Reginald. He lives under my--under your bureau. He's really not troublesome; but he's building a nest under the bureau, and if you don't know about him, it's rather unsettling to see a paper pattern from the sewing-room, or a piece of cloth, moving across the floor."
Mr. Le Moyne thought it might be very interesting. "Although, if there's nest-building going on, isn't it--er--possible that Reginald is a