“No, sir—­only a friend.”

“Ah! onlier than a sister, may be?  Well!”

Sunderline replied nothing, beyond a look.

“I beg your pardon.  It’s none of my business.”

“It’s none of my business, so far as I know,” said Frank.  “If it were, there would be no pardon to beg.”

“You’re a fine fellow; and she’s a fine girl.  I suppose I may say that.  I tell you what; if you had come to grief, at the very end of this job you’ve done so well for me, I believe I should have put the place under the hammer.  I couldn’t have begun with such a piece of Friday luck as that!”

There were long pauses between the talk, as Ray and Frank drove back together into the city.

“Ray!” Frank said at last, suddenly, just as they came opposite to the row of little brown big-hatted houses, where they had talked about the bonny bowls,—­“My life is either worth more or less to me, after this.  You are the only woman in the world I could like to owe it to.  Will you take what I owe?  Will you be the onliest woman in the world to me?”

Oddly enough, that word of Mr. Newrich’s, that had half affronted him, came up to his lips involuntarily and unexpectedly, now.  Words are apt to come up so—­in a sort of spite of us—­that have made an impression, even when it has been that of simple misuse.

Ray did not answer.  She felt it quite impossible to speak.

Frank waited—­three minutes perhaps.  Then he said,

“Tell me, Ray.  If it is to be no, let me know it.”

“If it had been no.  I could have said it sooner,” Ray answered, softly.

* * * * *

“May I come back?” he asked, when he helped her down at the door in Pilgrim Street, and held her hand fast for a minute.

“O yes; come back and see mother,” Ray replied, her face all beautiful with smile and color.

Mother knew all the story, that minute, as well as when it was told her afterward.  She saw her child’s face, and that holding of the hand, from her upper window, where a half blind had fallen to.  Mothers do not miss the home-comings from such drives as that.

* * * * *

“There’s one thing, Frank,”—­said Ray.  She was standing with him, three hours afterward, at the low step of the entrance, he above her on the sidewalk, looking down upon her upturned face.  The happy tea and family evening were over; that first family evening, when one comes acknowledged in, who has been almost one of the family before; and they were saying the first beautiful good-by, which has the beginning of all joining and belonging in it.  “There is one thing, Frank.  I’m under contract for the present; for quite a while.  I’m going into the bread business, after all.  I’ve promised Miss Grapp to take her bakery, and manage it for her, for a year or so.”

“Who—­is—­Miss Grapp?” exclaimed Frank, pausing between the words in his astonishment.