Footsteps outside distracted her from the nervous, dreamy mood.  Some one was coming along the hall.  Her heart gave a wild bound—­then sank.  The steps passed by her door.  She heard the thick, maudlin voice of a man and the hollow, trilling laugh of a girl.

Allie’s legs began to grow weak under her.  The strain, the suspense, the longing grew to be too much for her and occasioned a revulsion of feeling.  She had let her hopes carry her too high.

Suddenly the door-handle rattled and turned.  Allie was brought to a stifling expectancy, motionless in the center of the room.  Some one was outside at the door.  Could it be Neale?  It must be!  Her sensitive ears caught short, puffing breaths—­then the click of a key in the lock.  Allie stood there in an anguish of suspense, with the lift of her heart almost suffocating her.  Like a leaf in the wind she quivered.

Whoever was out there fumbled at the key.  Then the lock rasped, the handle turned, the door opened.  A tall man swaggered in, with head bent sideways, his hand removing the key from the lock.  Before he saw Allie he closed the door.  With that he faced around.

Allie recognized the red face, the flashing eyes, the flaming hair.

“Larry!” she cried, with bursting heart.  She took a quick step, ready to leap into his arms, but his violent start checked her.  Larry staggered back—­put a hand out.  His face was heated and flushed as Allie had never seen it.  A stupid surprise showed there.  Slowly his hand moved up to cross his lips, to brush through his red hair; then with swifter movement it swept back to feel the door, as if he wanted the touch of tangible things.

“Reckon I’m seein’ ’em again!” he muttered to himself.  “Oh, Larry—­ I’m Allie Lee!” she cried, holding out her hands.

She saw the color fade out of his face.  A shock seemed to go over his body.  He took a couple of dragging strides toward her.  His eyes had the gaze of a man who did not believe what he saw.  The hand he reached out shook.

“I’m no ghost!  Larry, don’t—­you—­know me?” she faltered.  Indeed he must have thought her a phantom.  Great, clammy drops stood out upon his brow.

“Dear old—­redhead!” she whispered, brokenly, with a smile of agony and joy.  He would know her when she spoke that way—­called him the name she had tormented him with—­the name no one else would have dared to use.

Then she saw he believed in her reality.  His face began to work.  She threw her arms about him—­she gave up to a frenzy of long-deferred happiness.  Where Larry was there would Neale be.

“Allie—­it ain’t—­you?” he asked, hoarsely, as he hugged her close.

“Oh, Larry—­yes—­yes—­and I’ll die of joy!” she whispered.

“Then you shore ain’t—­daid?” he went on, incredulously.

How sweet to Allie was the old familiar Southern drawl!

“Dead?  Never....Why, I’ve kissed you! ... and you haven’t kissed me back.”