of the best fellows
he knew. But his virtues were not the sort that a Dream Knight
possessed, especially when you were only nineteen and out on the road
for adventure.

Christina sat on the stile and gazed down the road that crossed the
little brown stream and then became the village street. She could see
the church spire above the orchard trees, and hear the "cling clung" of
Mark Falls' blacksmith shop, and the shouts of the school children out
for their morning recess. But there was no smallest sign of an
additional adventure. Evidently this was the announcement of her fate.
And as she sat there, filled with restless longing, a car appeared in a
cloud of dust away on the hilltop at the other end of the village, and
even in the midst of her disappointment Opportunity was speeding
towards her on rapid wheels.

CHAPTER II

AWAY FROM ORCHARD GLEN

Mrs. Johnnie Dunn, driving home from town in her new Ford car, spun
down the hill and through the village, without even stopping at the
post office.

Mrs. Dunn was the only truly emancipated woman of Orchard Glen; her
husband was a quiet, shy little man, whom every one called "Marthy,"
and he always referred proudly to his clever wife as "The Woman." She
managed her husband, her household, her farm, and a dozen other
enterprises such as no woman was ever supposed to be able to manage,
and did it all in such a thoroughly capable manner that she was the
envy and the scandal of the whole neighbourhood.

Her latest escapade had been to buy up the old Simms place, next to her
own farm, turn it all into pasture for cows, buy a milking machine and
a Ford car, and go dashing into town every morning with milk for a list
of customers that astonished all the milkmen of the district. And she
often came tearing back to her day's work when the lazy village folk
were shaking the breakfast tablecloth out of the back door!

As she came storming down into the village on this bright May morning,
Marmaduke Simms was sitting on the store veranda as usual, with his peg
leg displayed upon a soap box, as his eternal excuse for his idleness.
But there was no excuse for Trooper Tom Boyd, The Woman's own nephew,
whose two perfectly good legs were stretched out beside him, and all in
the middle of a morning in the middle of seeding!

Trooper Tom had once ridden the prairies in the Mounted Police force,
but though he had been one of the most fearless riders of the plains,
he was frank