ts swift, curving flight;
then, dropping it, exclaimed: "Gone--oh, little thing!"

"What was it?" I asked, for it might have been a bird, a bird-like moth,
or a bee.

"Did you not see? And you asked me to look into your eyes!"

"Ah, little squirrel Sakawinki, you remind me of that!" I said, passing
my arm round her waist and drawing her a little closer. "Look into my
eyes now and see if I am blind, and if there is nothing in them except
an image of Rima like a small, small fly."

She shook her head and laughed a little mockingly, but made no effort to
escape from my arm.

"Would you like me always to do what you wish, Rima--to follow you in
the woods when you say 'Come'--to chase you round the tree to catch you,
and lie down for you to throw leaves on me, and to be glad when you are
glad?"

"Oh, yes."

"Then let us make a compact. I shall do everything to please you, and
you must promise to do everything to please me."

"Tell me."

"Little things, Rima--none so hard as chasing you round a tree. Only to
have you stand or sit by me and talk will make me happy. And to begin
you must call me by my name--Abel."

"Is that your name? Oh, not your real name! Abel, Abel--what is that? It
says nothing. I have called you by so many names--twenty, thirty--and no
answer."

"Have you? But, dearest girl, every person has a name, one name he is
called by. Your name, for instance, is Rima, is it not?"

"Rima! only Rima--to you? In the morning, in the evening... now in this
place and in a little while where know I? ... in the night when you wake
and it is dark, dark, and you see me all the same. Only Rima--oh, how
strange!"

"What else, sweet girl? Your grandfather Nuflo calls you Rima."

"Nuflo?" She spoke as if putting a question to herself. "Is that an
old man with two dogs that lives somewhere in the wood?" And then, with
sudden petulance: "And you ask me to talk to you!"

"Oh, Rima, what can I say to you? Listen--"

"No, no," she exclaimed, quickly turning and putting her fingers on my
mouth to stop my speech, while a sudden merry look shone in her eyes.
"You shall listen when I speak, and do all I say. And tell me what to
do to please you with your eyes--let me look in your eyes that are not
blind."

She turned her face more towards me and with head a little thrown back
and inclined to one side, gazing now full into my eyes as I had wished
her to do. After a few moments she glanced away to the distant trees.