It was late at night when the party returned.  The carriage drove to the Benson cottage; King helped Irene to alight, coolly bade her good-night, and went to his barracks.  But it was not a good night to sleep.  He tossed about, he counted every step of the late night birds on his gallery; he got up and lighted a cigar, and tried dispassionately to think the matter over.  But thinking was of no use.  He took pen and paper; he would write a chill letter of farewell; he would write a manly avowal of his passion; he would make such an appeal that no woman could resist it.  She must know, she did know—­what was the use of writing?  He sat staring at the blank prospect.  Great heavens! what would become of his life if he lost the only woman in the world?  Probably the world would go on much the same.  Why, listen to it!  The band was playing on the lawn at four o’clock in the morning.  A party was breaking up after a night of german and a supper, and the revelers were dispersing.  The lively tunes of “Dixie,” “Marching through Georgia,” and “Home, Sweet Home,” awoke the echoes in all the galleries and corridors, and filled the whole encampment with a sad gayety.  Dawn was approaching.  Good-nights and farewells and laughter were heard, and the voice of a wanderer explaining to the trees, with more or less broken melody, his fixed purpose not to go home till morning.

Stanhope King might have had a better though still a sleepless night if he had known that Mr. Meigs was packing his trunks at that hour to the tune of “Home, Sweet Home,” and if he had been aware of the scene at the Benson cottage after he bade Irene good-night.  Mrs. Benson had a light burning, and the noise of the carriage awakened her.  Irene entered the room, saw that her mother was awake, shut the door carefully, sat down on the foot of the bed, said, “It’s all over, mother,” and burst into the tears of a long-repressed nervous excitement.

“What’s over, child?” cried Mrs. Benson, sitting bolt-upright in bed.

“Mr. Meigs.  I had to tell him that it couldn’t be.  And he is one of the best men I ever knew.”

“You don’t tell me you’ve gone and refused him, Irene?”

“Please don’t scold me.  It was no use.  He ought to have seen that I did not care for him, except as a friend.  I’m so sorry!”

“You are the strangest girl I ever saw.”  And Mrs. Benson dropped back on the pillow again, crying herself now, and muttering, “I’m sure I don’t know what you do want.”

When King came out to breakfast he encountered Mr. Benson, who told him that their friend Mr. Meigs had gone off that morning—­had a sudden business call to Boston.  Mr. Benson did not seem to be depressed about it.  Irene did not appear, and King idled away the hours with his equally industrious companion under the trees.  There was no german that morning, and the hotel band was going through its repertoire for the benefit of a champagne party on the lawn.  There was nothing melancholy about this party; and King couldn’t help saying to Mrs. Farquhar that it hardly represented his idea of the destitution and depression resulting from the war; but she replied that they must do something to keep up their spirits.