seemed about to say something in reference to my name, but he checked himself, and urged us to sit down again.
"What you must do now is to get warm—get warm," he said, and he put two great logs on the fire.
With a few quick questions, and without sitting down, he made himself acquainted with the situation. For a moment he gazed down upon us, and then he said, "The first thing to do, now that you are a little thawed, is to get off your coats and wraps."
"That is hardly worth while," I replied, "for as soon as we are well warmed, we must get on, in some way or other, to the Dolliver house."
"Sir," said Major Pendallas, "there is no Dolliver house for you to-night. Here you are, and here you stay. It is three miles back to the main road, and then you would have two miles more to go, and before you reached the Dolliver house there is a long hollow, and at this present moment the snow is probably drifted five feet. If you had taken the right road you most likely would have been in that snow-drift now. I have sleighs and teams enough, and no doubt I could pull you through, but it is blowing now as well as snowing, and I am not going to let a young lady go out into a storm like this, especially when she has had already as much as she is able to stand of that sort of thing. Your bags will be brought in, and your horse put in the stable. Mrs. Bardsley will take charge of Miss Welden. I'll attend to you, sir, and supper will be ready in half an hour," and without waiting for an answer he left the room.
"We three sat down to a big round supper table."
We looked at each other and laughed.
"That is just what I hoped he would do," said Miss Welden. "I have had all the sleighing I want for this day."
"Good," I cried, throwing off my overcoat; "I feared I might have to persuade you."
"That is really absurd," she said; "as if the storm and Major Pendallas were not quite enough."
In five minutes Miss Welden had been carried off by the beaming Mrs. Bardsley, while Major Pendallas conducted me to a bedroom on the ground floor, in which I found a crackling wood fire. The house was a large one, and seemed to be lighted from top to bottom.
We three sat down to a big round sup-
