ing to have
a lot of fun before we're many days older."

Payne did not pause to look back or reply. Garman's taunts had driven
him close to the point of explosion. The wretched situation in which
he found himself in regard to the land he had paid for and drained was
a muddle in his mind. Senator Fairclothe's brazen confession was a
confusion. The one thing that was clear to his comprehension--as a
touch of white-hot steel is clear to its victim--was Garman's assertion
that Annette had changed and was becoming her father's daughter. And
when he came upon her--rather when she stepped out before him--in the
hidden path near the edge of the wild apple trees, Roger saw that
Garman had spoken the truth.

She had changed. She had grown older. Her beauty was as great as
ever, but it was now the beauty of a sophisticated, disillusioned and
hardened woman, rather than that of the buoyant girl he had known. He
could not define the change that had taken place in her, so subtle was
it; but as he looked at her he instinctively flung out his hand, a
gesture of pleading for something gone, and cried out in youth's agony:

"Annette! Annette!"

And then the miracle happened. At the sight of him, at the heart throb
in his tones as he called her name, she seemed to shiver, then to
awaken. She seemed to change before his eyes; though it was only he,
seeing with the eyes which that moment had given him, who could have
been sensible of the change. She seemed to grow and freshen as a
parched rose at the touch of life-giving water. Her eyes gleamed with
the old, frank look, her cheeks were rosy, and she walked girlishly as
she came forward.

"Ah! Goody, goody!" she cried, clapping her hands. "Somebody likes me
the other way--the way I want to be!"

"Annette!" he said again, and stretched out his hands and touched hers
and held them.

"You--are happy again now, aren't you?" he stammered.

"Don't I look it?"

Her eyes were brimming with soothing tears.

"Happy?"

"Yes--for a minute."

He drew her hands against his breast. He held her so, and she looked
up, her wet eyes close to his. He put an arm about his shoulders, and
she nestled against his strength with a little sigh of content. And
then he drew her closer to him, and they kissed once, instinctively,
naturally; and she threw her head back and cried, "Ah, God! No, no!"

"Annette! Annette! What is it?"

"No, no! Let me go--let me go, dear. Please--you