It was on the tip of Jo's tongue to ask; but she checked herself in time, and with unusual tact, tried to find out in a roundabout way.

`I suppose you are going to college soon? I see you pegging away at your books - no, I mean studying hard'; and Jo blushed at the dreadful `pegging' which had escaped her.

Laurie smiled, but didn't seem shocked, and answered, with a shrug:

`Not for a year or two; I won't go before seventeen, anyway.'

`Aren't you but fifteen?' asked Jo, looking at the tall lad, whom she had imagined seventeen already.

`Sixteen, next month.'

`How I wish I was going to college! You don't look as if you liked it.'

`I hate it! Nothing but grinding or skylarking. And I don't like the way fellows do either in this country.'

`What do you like?'

`To live in Italy, and to enjoy myself in my own way.'

Jo wanted very much to ask what his own way was: but his black brows looked rather threatening as he knit them; so she changed the subject by saying, as her foot kept time, `That's a splendid piano in the next room. Why don't you go and try it?'

`If you will come too,' he answered, with a gallant little bow.

`I can't; for I told Meg I wouldn't, because--' There Jo stopped, and looked undecided whether to tell or to laugh. `Because what?' asked Laurie, curiously.

`You won't tell?'

`Never!'

`Well, I have a bad trick of standing before the fire, and so I burn my frocks, and I scorched this one; and though it's nicely mended, it shows, and Meg told me to keep still, so no one would see it. You may laugh, if you want to; it is funny, I know.' But Laurie didn't laugh; he only looked down a minute, and the expression of his face puzzled Jo, when he said very gently: `Never mind that. Please come.'

Jo thanked him, and gladly went, wishing she had two neat gloves, when she saw the nice, pearl-coloured ones her partner wore.

When the music stopped, they sat down; and Laurie was in the midst of an account of a students' festival at Heidelberg, when Meg appeared in search of her sister. She beckoned, and Jo reluctantly followed her into a side room, where she found her on a sofa, holding her foot, and looking pale. `I've sprained my ankle. That stupid high heel turned, and gave me a sad wrench. It aches so I can hardly stand, and I don't know how I'm ever going to get home,' she said, rocking to and fro in pain.

`I knew you'd hurt your feet with those silly shoes. I'm sorry. But I don't see what you can do, except get a carriage, or stay here all night,' answered Jo, softly rubbing the poor ankle as she spoke.

`I can't have a carriage, without its costing ever so much.'

I daresay I can't get one at all; for most people come in their own, and it's a long way to the stable, and no one to lend.'