and rest."

CHAPTER III

THE VALLEY

The long twilight of the June day had changed into a night that was
scarcely darker, so bright was the moonlight. Seen from the house, the
barn and the low buildings beyond loomed shadowy and unreal, yet very
beautiful. On the side porch of the house sat Simeon Holly and his
wife, content to rest mind and body only because a full day's work lay
well done behind them.

It was just as Simeon rose to his feet to go indoors that a long note
from a violin reached their ears.

"Simeon!" cried the woman. "What was that?"

The man did not answer. His eyes were fixed on the barn.

"Simeon, it's a fiddle!" exclaimed Mrs. Holly, as a second tone
quivered on the air "And it's in our barn!"

Simeon's jaw set. With a stern ejaculation he crossed the porch and
entered the kitchen.

In another minute he had returned, a lighted lantern in his hand.

"Simeon, d--don't go," begged the woman, tremulously. "You--you don't
know what's there."

"Fiddles are not played without hands, Ellen," retorted the man
severely. "Would you have me go to bed and leave a half-drunken,
ungodly minstrel fellow in possession of our barn? To-night, on my way
home, I passed a pretty pair of them lying by the roadside--a man and a
boy with two violins. They're the culprits, likely,--though how they
got this far, I don't see. Do you think I want to leave my barn to
tramps like them?"

"N--no, I suppose not," faltered the woman, as she rose tremblingly to
her feet, and followed her husband's shadow across the yard.

Once inside the barn Simeon Holly and his wife paused involuntarily.
The music was all about them now, filling the air with runs and trills
and rollicking bits of melody. Giving an angry exclamation, the man
turned then to the narrow stairway and climbed to the hayloft above. At
his heels came his wife, and so her eyes, almost as soon as his fell
upon the man lying back on the hay with the moonlight full upon his
face. Instantly the music dropped to a whisper, and a low voice came
out of the gloom beyond the square of moonlight which came from the
window in the roof.

"If you'll please be as still as you can, sir. You see he's asleep and
he's so tired," said the voice.

For a moment the man and the woman on the stairway paused in amazement,
then the man lifted his lantern and strode toward the voice.

"Who are you? What are you doing here?" he demanded sharply.

A boy's face, round, tanne