tops with Tree Mother.
But they never will. Come play with them again sometime, Eric. They
often talk about you."

"I'll come to-day and bring Ivra if they'll play with her, too!"

But Nora shook her head as she went away. "They don't believe in Ivra.
How could they play with her? Their grandmother can teach them nothing.
But they'll like the story of this adventure none the less for not
believing it."

When she was gone the three took the dishes into the house and washed
them. Then they went out and worked in the garden until dusk.

CHAPTER XVII

THE JUNE MOON

Now every day Eric was becoming acquainted with strange Forest People:
those who had hidden away from winter in trees, and those who were
wandering up from the south along with the birds, and Blue Water People,
of course, all along the Forest streams. The Forest teemed with new
playmates for him and Ivra.

Hide-and-go-seek was still the favorite game. And now it was more fun to
be "It" than to be hiding almost, for one was likely to come upon
strangers peeping out of tree hollows, swimming under water, or swinging
in the tree tops, any minute. When the person who was "It" came across
one of these strangers he would simply say, "I spy, and you're It." Then
he would draw the stranger away to the goal, where he usually joined the
game and was as much at home as though he had been playing in it from
the very first.

The day that Eric found Wild Thyme so was the best of all,--or rather
she was the best of all. And that was strange, for when he first spied
her he did not like her at all. Her dress was a purple slip just to her
knees, with a big rent in the skirt. Her hair was short and bushy and
dark. And her face was soberer than most Forest People's faces. She was
sitting out at the edge of the Forest on a flat rock, her chin in her
hands, and she did not look eager to make friends with any one.

But he cried, "I spy! You're It!" just the same. She did not lift her
eyes. She only said, "You must catch me first. I am Wild Thyme, and that
will be hard!"

Eric laughed, for she was not a yard away from him. And he sprang
forward as he laughed. But she was quicker than he. She had been at
perfect rest on the rock, her chin in her hands, and not looking at him,
but the instant he jumped she was off like a flash, a purple streak
across the field.

But Eric did not let his surprise delay him. He ran after her just as
fast as he could, and that was ve