208 TROTTY’S WEDDING TOUR.

And still she could not speak when they rode into Brick
Alley, and Jim McMahoney and her mother and the chil-
dren who did not wonder came out to mect her, and take her
back to her high chair.

She was too happy to speak. She need never wonder any
more. She could remember.

But the young lady did not want her to speak. She
touched her white horse, and was gone in a minute; and
when Androscoggin rung them both to sleep that night —
for the young lady forgot to ask for her Cluny, and was too
tired to go to the party — I am sure I cannot tell which was
the happier, she or Deb. Androscoggin did not trouble him-
self to find out. All he said was, Forever and forever. Deb
knows. She heard him. She had no need to wonder about
him any more. She understood.

And this is all I have to tell. Whether the young lady
took Deb to ride again or whether she did n’t—this is all I
have to tell. It isa very little thing to have to tell, but when
it was told to me, I thought it was the sweetest, saddest,
tenderest little thing in the world.

“ Tf you had n’t said anything about it, I’d have cried,”
observed Trotty, when they had finished the story of Deb. In
his heart he wondered if Deb ever fought a duel; but he did
not say so.