“Can’t he come some other time?”

“I should say not; certainly not for months.  He’s off to South America for a long stay—­has this one day to himself.  You see it wasn’t till I met him yesterday that I realized what the fellow had become; and then it came over me all at once what it might mean to have him meet Dot just now.  I’m no matchmaker—­”

“I should say that is just what you are!”

“No; but—­’There is a tide,’ you know.  And Dot certainly has me worried to death over Ridge Jordan.”

“But, Julius”—­Mrs. Jack’s voice took on a tinge of anxiety—­“we’ve always thought well of Ridge.  I don’t just see—­”

“I know you don’t.  He’s not the man for Dot.  I want a real man for her.  I’ve got him.  Wait till you see Kirke!”

“You seem to think it’s very simple—­”

“By George, I think it is!  I know how he felt about her when she was a youngster:  adored the ground she walked on.  She never looked at him.  I tell you she’ll look at him now; he’s worth looking at.”

“If he’s so fine looking he may be engaged to some other girl.”

“He’s not.  I made sure of that,” declared Julius, audacity gleaming in his eyes as usual.  “Besides, I tell you, he’s not that sort.  He’s no matinee idol for looks; maybe you wouldn’t even call him good looking.  I do; he’s got the goods in his face, handsome or not.  I tell you he’s a real man.  Dot hasn’t seen one yet.  I’ll make her see Kirke—­somehow.  You wait.”

He marched away, head up, eyes thoughtful, lips pursed in a whistle.

Next morning, when three luxurious motor cars stopped at Mrs. Jack’s door, Julius was lounging on the porch.  It was his Senior vacation; he could be forgiven for lounging.  In his flannels, hands in pockets, he strolled down the steps with his sister to see her off, though Ridgeway Jordan was escorting her devotedly.  He surveyed her, as he followed her, with brotherly pride.

“That sister of mine has all the rest of them beaten at the quarter-mile,” was his inward reflection.  “Not much money to do it on, but she certainly knows how to get herself up to look as if she’d just walked out of a tailor’s box and a milliner’s bandbox.  Made that stunner of a hat herself, I’ll wager.  Fresh as a peach, her face, too.  The others look a bit jaded.”

Along with these inner comments he was keeping up a running fire of talk with two of the bridesmaids, whom he knew well.  His bright black eyes, however, noted that Dorothy’s place in the first car was next that of Ridgeway Jordan, and that the face of that young man was soberer than usual.

“Bad sign,” he reflected as he turned away, after a hot-and-heavy exchange of banter with certain of the men as the car prepared to start.  “When a chap begins to look solemn, sitting beside a girl you know he’s in love with, you can be sure he has it on his mind to have it out with her before the day is over.  If I could have just got Kirke to her yesterday!  Ridge may do it any time now; I can see it in his eye—­and she may take him.  I don’t know what’s got into Dot.  A month ago she’d have laughed at the idea of marrying him; but now I can’t be sure of her.  It’s this idiotic bridal hysteria that’s got her in its grip.  By George, she shan’t take him!”