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“Don’t be vexed, Alicia,” I entreated. “I only asked because–well, it is no matter.”

* * * * *

Montreal, Jan. 25, 18–.

It is bedtime, but I am too excited and happy and miserable to sleep. Jack has been here–dear old Jack! How glad I was to see him.

His coming was so unexpected. I was sitting alone in my room this afternoon–I believe I was moping–when Bessie brought up his card. I gave it one rapturous look and tore downstairs, passing Alicia in the hall like a whirlwind, and burst into the drawing-room in a most undignified way.

“Jack!” I cried, holding out both hands to him in welcome.

There he was, just the same old Jack, with his splendid big shoulders and his lovely brown eyes. And his necktie was crooked, too; as soon as I could get my hands free I put them up and straightened it out for him. How nice and old-timey that was!

“So you are glad to see me, Kitty?” he said as he squeezed my hands in his big strong paws.

“‘Deed and ‘deed I am, Jack. I thought you had forgotten me altogether. And I’ve been so homesick and so–so everything,” I said incoherently. “And, oh, Jack, I’ve so many questions to ask I don’t know where to begin. Tell me all the Thrush Hill and Valleyfield news, tell me everything that has happened since I left. How many people have you killed off? And, oh, why didn’t you come to see me before?”

“I didn’t think I should be wanted, Kitty,” Jack answered quietly. “You seemed to be so absorbed in your new life that old friends and interests were crowded out.”

“So I was at first,” I answered penitently. “I was dazzled, you know. The glare was too much for my Thrush Hill brown. But it’s different now. How did you happen to come, Jack?”

“I had to come to Montreal on business, and I thought it would be too bad if I went back without coming to see what they had been doing in Vanity Fair to my little playmate.”

“Well, what do you think they have been doing?” I asked saucily.

I had on a particularly fetching gown and knew I was looking my best. Jack, however, looked me over with his head on one side.

“Well, I don’t know, Kitty,” he said slowly. “That is a stunning sort of dress you have on–not so pretty, though, as that old blue muslin you used to wear last summer–and your hair is pretty good. But you look rather disdainful and, after all, I believe I prefer Thrush Hill Kitty.”

How like Jack that was. He never thought me really pretty, and he is too honest to pretend he does.

But I didn’t care. I just laughed, and we sat down together and had a long, delightful, chummy talk.

Jack told me all the Valleyfield gossip, not forgetting to mention that Mary Carter was going to be married to a minister in June. Jack didn’t seem to mind it a bit, so I guess he couldn’t have been particularly interested in Mary.

In due time Alicia sailed in. I suppose she had found out from Bessie who my caller was, and felt rather worried over the length of our tete-a-tete.

She greeted Jack very graciously, but with a certain polite condescension of which she is past mistress. I am sure Jack felt it, for, as soon as he decently could, he got up to go. Alicia asked him to remain to dinner.

“We are having a few friends to dine with us, but it is quite an informal affair,” she said sweetly.

I felt that Jack glanced at me for the fraction of a second. But I remembered that Gus Sinclair was coming too, and I did not look at him.

Then he declined quietly. He had a business engagement, he said.

I suppose Alicia had noticed that look at me, for she showed her claws.

“Don’t forget to call any time you are in Montreal,” she said more sweetly than ever. “I am sure Katherine will always be glad to see any of her old friends, although some of her new ones are proving very absorbing–one, in especial. Don’t blush, Katherine, I am sure Mr. Willoughby won’t tell any tales out of school to your old Valleyfield friends.”