little at her own words,
foreseeing those mail-order-cut clothes and the resolute butterflyness
of the tie greeting her on Fifth Avenue.

"What to do?"

"Sell tickets at the Grand Central Station, of course!" she shot back at
him. "Ban, you _are_ aggravating! 'What to do?' Father would find you
some sort of place while you were fitting in."

'No. I wouldn't take a job from you any more than I'd take anything
else."

"You carry principles to the length of absurdity. Come and get your own
job, then. You're not timid, are you?"

"Not particularly. I'm just contented."

At that provocation her femininity flared. "Ban," she cried with
exasperation and appeal enchantingly mingled, "aren't you going to miss
me at all when I go?"

"I've been trying not to think of that," he said slowly.

"Well, think of it," she breathed. "No!" she contradicted herself
passionately. "Don't think of it. I shouldn't have said that.... I don't
know what is the matter with me to-day, Ban. Perhaps I _am_ fey." She
smiled to him slantwise.

"It's the air," he answered judicially. "There's another storm brewing
somewhere or I'm no guesser. More trouble for the schedule."

"That's right!" she cried eagerly. "_Be_ the Atkinson and St. Philip
station-agent again. Let's talk about trains. It's--it's so reliable."

"Far from it on this line," he answered, adopting her light tone.
"Particularly if we have more rain. You may become a permanent resident
yet."

Some rods short of the Van Arsdale cabin the trail took a sharp turn
amidst the brush. Halfway on the curve Io caught at Banneker's near
rein.

"Hark!" she exclaimed.

The notes of a piano sounded faintly clear in the stillness. As the
harmonies dissolved and merged, a voice rose above them, resonant and
glorious, rose and sank and pleaded and laughed and loved, while the two
young listeners leaned unconsciously toward each other in their saddles.
Silence fell again. The very forest life itself seemed hushed in a
listening trance.

"Heavens!" whispered Banneker. "Who is it?"

"Camilla Van Arsdale, of course. Didn't you know?"

"I knew she was musical. I didn't know she had a voice like that."

"Ten years ago New York was wild over it."

"But why--"

"Hush! She's beginning again."

Once more the sweep of the chords was followed by the superb voice while
the two wayfarers and all the world around them waited, breathless and
enchained. At the end, Banneker said dreamily:

"I'