had been vouchsafed, looked up
with dignity.

"_I_ am taking care of this little girl," he said deliberately, and
turned his back.

The man chuckled and passed on.

For a long time they sat side by side looking straight out before them.

"Celia," said Bobby without turning his head, "I love you. Do you love
me?"

"Yes," said Celia steadily.

Neither stirred by so much as a hair's breadth. After a little they
arose and returned to the hotel. Neither spoke again.

Strangely enough the subject was not again referred to, although of
course the children continued to play together and the excursions were
not intermitted. There seemed to be nothing to say. They loved each
other, and they were glad of each other's nearness. It sufficed.

Each morning Bobby awoke with a great uplift of the spirit, and a great
longing, which was completely appeased when he had come into Celia's
presence. Each evening he retired filled with an impatience for the
coming day, and with divine rapture of little memories of what had that
day passed. It seemed to him that hour by hour he and Celia drew closer
in a sweet secret, intimacy that nevertheless demanded no outer symbol.
When he spoke to her of the simplest things, or she to him, he
experienced a warm, cosy drawing near, as though beneath the commonplace
remark lay something hidden and subtle to which each must bend the ear
of the spirit gently. This was the soul of it, a supreme inner
gentleness one to the other, no matter how boisterous, how laughing, how
brusque might be the spoken word. And in correspondence all the
beautiful sunlit summer world took on a new softness and splendour and
glory in which they walked, but whose source they did not understand.

This much for the essence of it. But of course, Bobby, being masculine
must give presents after his own notion, and being a small boy must give
them according to his age. The quarter he had earned from his father he
invested in a pack of cards on the upper left-hand corner of which were
embossed marvellous doves, wonderful flowers and miraculous tangles of
scroll-work in colour. These he printed with Celia's name and address.
Near the wharf and railroad station stood a small booth from which a
discouraged-looking individual tried to sell curios. Bobby's eye fell on
a cheap bracelet of silver wire from which dangled half a dozen
moonstones. It caught his eye; day by day his desire for it grew;
finally he asked advice on the subj