"Get up, Helen," Sadie urged, as the blue eyes reluctantly opened. "Get up and dress, dear--we haven't much time."
"Much time for what?" asked Helen, sitting up and going through the ceremony of rubbing her eyes.
A roseate blush spread up from the ribbons at Sadie's throat to the roots of her fair hair.
Helen's eyes were wide open now and she looked at her cousin in frowning puzzlement.
"And Mr. Hogg is expected," said Sadie, with swift inspiration.
"Whatever are you driving at?" asked Helen.
"Are you anxious to greet Mr. Hogg?" pouted Sadie.
"Then we must be out when he comes--and I have an important engagement at eleven."
Helen shot two little pink feet out of the covers and planked them down on the velvety rug.
"Whom have you an engagement with, Sadie Burton?" she asked, with breathless eagerness.
This time Sadie turned her head to hide her blushes.
Helen seemed actually paralyzed. There was an intense pause before Sadie wheeled round, flung her head defiantly and said with more fire than she had ever in her life displayed:
"With Mr. Whitney Barnes--and you are going to assist me--you and Mr. Gladwin."
"You--cannot--be--serious, Sadie?" said the older cousin, slowly.
"I am, though!" was the passionate rejoinder. "Nanette and I packed my steamer trunk after you and Auntie went to bed. Hurry now, Helen, dear, for we must be at the Little Church Around the Corner at eleven o'clock. I am going to wear my gray travelling dress and you your brown."
"Why, you dreadful little minx, you!" cried Helen. "If you are poking fun at me I will never forgive you."
"I am not poking fun," retorted Sadie with the same ardor and almost in tears. "It is all planned and arranged. Whitney promised to have everything ready at the church, including Travers Gladwin. He said he couldn't wait another minute after eleven o'clock--that the suspense would kill him--and he was so terribly in earnest about it that I believe him."
"You goose!" exclaimed Helen, but now she was smiling and there was a happy light in her eyes.
"Do you mean to tell me, Sadie Burton," she added, "that you fell in love with that young man in a few hours--_you_, the man-hater!"
"Y-y-yes," admitted Sadie, her cheeks again on fire.
"And a man you don't know anything about--a perfect stranger!"