he present, however,
important as she was to him, she was nevertheless distinctly secondary
to the Perdu itself with its nameless spell. If Celia was not there, and
if he did not care to fish, the boy still longed for the Perdu, and was
more than content to lie and watch for he knew not what, amid the rapt
herbage, and the brooding insects, and the gnome-like conspiracies of
the moisture exuding far under the bank.

Celia was two years younger than Reuben, and by nature somewhat less
imaginative. For a long time she loved the Perdu primarily for its
associations with the boy who was her playmate, her protector, and her
hero. When she was about seven years old Reuben had rescued her from an
angry turkey-cock, and had displayed a confident firmness which seemed
to her wonderfully fine. Hence had arisen an unformulated but enduring
faith that Reuben could be depended upon in any emergency. From that day
forward she had refused to be content with other playmates. Against this
uncompromising preference Mrs. Hansen was wont to protest rather
plaintively; for there were social grades even here, and Mrs. Hansen,
whose husband's acres were broad (including the Perdu itself), knew well
that "that Waugh boy" was not her Celia's equal.

The profound distinction, however, was not one which the children could
appreciate; and on Mrs. Hansen lay the spell of the neighborhood,
impelling her to wait for whatever might see fit to come to pass.

For these two children the years that slipped so smoothly over the Perdu
were full of interest. They met often. In the spring, when the Perdu was
sullen and unresponsive, and when the soggy meadows showed but a tinge
of green through the brown ruin of the winter's frosts, there was yet
the grove to visit. Here Reuben would make deep incisions in the bark of
the white birches, and gather tiny cupfuls of the faint-flavored sap,
which, to the children's palates, had all the relish of nectar. A
little later on there were the blossoms of the trillium to be
plucked,--blossoms whose beauty was the more alluring in that they were
supposed to be poisonous.

But it was with the deepening of the summer that the spell of the Perdu
deepened to its most enthralling potency. And as the little girl grew in
years and came more and more under her playmate's influence, her
imagination deepened as the summer deepens, her perception quickened and
grew subtle. Then in a quiet fashion, a strange thing came about. Unde