"And what is that?"
"You are to let me come sometimes while I wait, and wear this lest you should forget me," he said, pulling a ring from his pocket, and gently drawing a warm, bare hand out of the muff where it lay hidden.
"Yes, Archie, but not here,—not now!" cried Phebe, glancing about her, as if suddenly aware that they were not alone.
"No one can see us here: I thought of that. Give me one happy minute, after this long, long year of waiting," answered Archie, pausing just where the fountain hid them from all eyes, for there were houses only on one side.
Phebe submitted; and never did a plain gold ring slip more easily to its place than the one he put on in such a hurry that cold December day. Then one hand went back into the muff red with the grasp he gave it, and the other to its old place on his arm, with a confiding gesture, as if it had a right there.
"Now I feel sure of you," said Archie, as they went on again, and no one the wiser for that tender transaction behind the ugly pyramid of boards. "Mac wrote me that you were much admired by your church people, and that certain wealthy bachelors evidently had designs on the retiring Miss Moore. I was horribly jealous, but now I defy every man of them."
Phebe smiled with the air of proud humility that was so becoming, and answered briefly,—
