himself bowed before them with an adoration
that was framed in anguish because these things were, and were not for
him. More and more cruel grew the knowledge that the currents of his
life were gall and wormwood, flowing through wastes of bitterness.

Yet, along with the new grief came a new awakening, at first dimly felt
by Madeline alone, then read with greater and greater clearness.

But of all undercurrents, Dick, prime mover and chief talker, remained
unconscious, absorbed in his own dawning career, delighting in his two
friends chiefly as hearers and sympathizers with his multitudinous
ideas.

So it happened that one August afternoon, when it was late enough for
the sun to have lost its fury, a not too strenuous breeze drove their
tiny yacht through a channel which stretched enticingly between a wooded
island and the jutting mainland.

"Let's land there," Madeline exclaimed suddenly. "It looks like a jolly
place."

She pointed toward a stretch of beach caught between the arms of trees
that came to the very water's edge, and enshrined in a great wild
grape-vine that had climbed from branch to branch until it made a
tangled canopy.

Dick turned sharply inward and ran their prow into the twittering sand.

"Thou speakest and it is thy servant's place to obey," he said.

"How does it feel to keep slaves? I've often wondered," Ellery said as
he jumped ashore and Dick began tossing him rugs and cushions.

"Very comfy, thank you, and not at all un-Christian," she answered
saucily. "Dick, don't throw the supper basket, under penalty of
liquidating the sandwiches. I think there's a freezer of ice-cream under
the deck, if you'll pull it out. Now, are you ready for me?"

She stepped lightly forward under Dick's guidance, took Ellery's
outstretched hands and sprang to the shore, where a kind of throne was
built for her against a prostrate log,--all this help not because it was
necessary, but as the appropriate pomp of royalty.

"I suspect," said Dick, looking about him with great satisfaction, "that
this was a favorite picnic place for Gitche Manito and Hiawatha, in the
morning of days."

"That shows how nature can forget," Madeline retorted. "Surely you know
the real story, Dick."

"I don't," said Ellery. "Tell it to me."

She snuggled comfortably down into her rugs.

"In early days, which is the western equivalent for 'once upon a time,'
a furious storm raged down the lake and tore the water into long
ribb