r
pardon. But I don't suppose you're in earnest."

"Oh no, I'm not in earnest," said the girl, letting her wrists fall upon
her knees, and the clusters drop from her hands. "I'm not in earnest
about anything; that's the truth--that's the shame. Wouldn't you like,"
she broke off, "to be a priest, and go round among these people up here
on their frozen islands in the winter?"

"No," shouted Mavering, "I certainly shouldn't. I don't see how anybody
stands it. Ponkwasset Falls is bad enough in the winter, and compared to
this region Ponkwasset Falls is a metropolis. I believe in getting all
the good you can out of the world you were born in--of course without
hurting anybody else." He stretched his legs out on the bed of
sweet-fern, where he had thrown himself, and rested his head on his
hand lifted on his elbow. "I think this is what this place is fit for--a
picnic; and I wish every one well out of it for nine months of the
year."

"I don't," said the girl, with a passionate regret in her voice. "It
would be heavenly here with--But you--no, you're different. You always
want to share your happiness."

"I shouldn't call that happiness. But don't you?" asked Mavering.

"No. I'm selfish."

"You don't expect me to be believe that, I suppose."

"Yes," she went on, "it must be selfishness. You don't believe I'm so,
because you can't imagine it. But it's true. If I were to be happy, I
should be very greedy about it; I couldn't endure to let any one else
have a part in it. So it's best for me to be wretched, don't you see--to
give myself up entirely to doing for others, and not expect any one to
do anything for me; then I can be of some use in the world. That's why I
should like to go into a sisterhood."

Mavering treated it as the best kind of joke, and he was confirmed in
this view of it by her laughing with him, after a first glance of what
he thought mock piteousness.

XVI.

The clouds sailed across the irregular space of pale blue Northern sky
which the break in the woods opened for them overhead. It was so still
that they heard, and smiled to hear, the broken voices of the others,
who had gone to get berries in another direction--Miss Anderson's hoarse
murmur and Munt's artificial bass. Some words came from the party on the
rocks.

"Isn't it perfect?" cried the young fellow in utter content.

"Yes, too perfect," answered the girl, rousing herself from the reverie
in which they had both lost themselves, s