Leroys,
and if she really wanted to. She came back to the veranda and the
present.

"I think it would be charming, too," she replied.

"Then we'll go right away. I'll order the carriage, so as to see the
sunset," he said, and rose. "You will need wraps for Mrs. Garnier."
Somehow a man never thinks the other woman will need anything.

He spoke briskly and went off down the plank sidewalk towards town
with a swing. The day was fair, the air was soft, and the blood in the
Reverend Henderson, despite the dogmatic taint in it, was red and
young.

* * * * *

Out at Lake Nancy Osceola, a young fellow in flannel shirt,
knickerbockers and canvas shoes, was scanning the shore from a wooden
pier which ran out the extent of shallow water, having just made fast
the sail-boat rising and falling with the swell at the pier's end.

A grove of well grown orange trees stretched up the slope from the
water. The trees were heavy with fruit and looked sturdy and well
cared for. To the right stood the frame packing sheds, and beyond,
amid higher foliage against the cerulean sky, showed a house roof.

But the young fellow on the pier was gazing in the other direction,
where, through the straight vistas of the grove, a carriage was being
driven under the trees, the top sweeping the fruit laden branches. The
young man hallooed as he started in the pier, but a negro digging
among the trees had dropped his spade and was running up. The carriage
stopped and the young minister of the Aden Episcopal Church got out.
Naturally, it was to be supposed that it was some person with no more
common sense.

But there were others than the Reverend Mr. Henderson descending--two
ladies. Some party from the hotel come for a sail, probably.

It was the duty of coloured Pete to go with sailing parties, but there
was work that he should finish this afternoon. The old darky was
backing the horse. The minister and the ladies were approaching.

The young fellow was just in from a sail, having been down to the
sedge land with his gun, but he would go again. He gave a call. "It's
all right, Pete; go on with the ditching."

His eyes were indifferent as he watched the approach, though their
glance was straight and clear and keen. Suddenly the look changed,
intensified, and the young fellow's shoulders squared.

The minister led the way, talking with the pretty, slight woman, who
stopped with protest every step as her feet went