thank heaven, though his pulses were
unquestionably alive. It was the exhilaration of healthy, powerful
attraction, of which his every capacity for judgment approved. He had
not been drugged by the enchantment which is like wine--he had been
stimulated by the charm which is like the feel of the fresh wind upon
the brow. Here was a girl who did not need the background of
artificiality, one who could stand the sunlight on her clear cheek--and
the sunlight on her soul--he knew that, without knowing how he knew. It
was written in her sweet, strong, spirited face, and it was there for
men to read. No man so blind but he can read a face like that.

The darkness had almost fallen when he forced himself to leave the spot.
But--reward for going while yet a trace of dusky light remained--he had
not reached the bottom of the hill road, up which his car had roared an
hour before, when he saw something fallen there which made him pull the
motor up upon its throbbing cylinders. He jumped out and ran to rescue
what had fallen. It was the bunch of rose haws he had so carefully
denuded of thorns, and which she had worn upon her breast for at least a
short time before she lost it. She had not thrown it away intentionally,
he was sure of that. If she had she would not have flung it
contemptuously into the middle of the road for him to see.

He put it into the pocket of his coat, where it made a queer bulge, but
he could not risk losing it by trusting it to the seat beside him. Until
he had won something that had been longer hers, it was a treasure not to
be lost.

Four miles toward town he passed the riding party and exchanged a fire
of gay salutations with them. When he had left them behind he could not
reach home too soon. He hurried to his rooms, hunted out a receptacle of
silver and crystal and filled it with water, placed the bunch of rose
haws in it and set the whole on his reading-table, under the electric
drop-light, where it made a spot of brilliant colour.

He had an invitation for the evening; he had cared little to accept it
when it had been given him; he was sorry now that he had not refused it.
As the hour drew near, his distaste grew upon him, but there was no way
in which he could withdraw without giving disappointment and even
offence. He went forth, therefore, with reluctance, to join precisely
such a party as he had many times made one of with pleasure and elation.
To-night, however, he found the greatest difficulty