hurried away.

He was hard at work when she returned, carrying a wicker basket.

Again he protested because she was taking so much trouble, but she laid
aside her coat and insisted on arranging the food on a corner of the
table, a happy flush on her cheeks, giving him thanks with her eyes when
he praised her gown.

"I'm going to look in on you after the show," she declared. "Father will
come with me."

Vona remained with him until the wall clock warned her.

She asked him to wait a moment when he brought her wraps. She stood
before him in her gay garb, wistfully appealing. "Frank, I was intending
to have a little play of my own with you at the hall to-night. I was
going to look right past that Durgin boy, straight down into your eyes,
when I came to a certain place in the play. I was intending to let the
folks of Egypt know something, providing they all don't know it by now.
This is what I have to say, and now I'm saying it to the only audience I
care for:

"'Twere vain to tell thee all I feel,
Or say for thee I'd die.
Ah, well-a-day, the sweetest melody
Could never, never say one half my love for thee."

Then, after a moment, she escaped from his ardent embrace.

"Remember that, dearest," she called from the doorway.

"I'll remember it every time I start with a line of figures, you blessed
girl. And then how my pencil will go dancing up the column!"

After she had gone he pulled the curtain cords, raising the curtains so
that they covered the lower sashes; he did not care to be seen at his
work by the folks who were on their way to the hall.

Squire Hexter, escorting Xoa, took the trouble to step to the window and
tap lightly with his cane. He was hoping that the cashier would change
his mind and go to the hall. He waited after tapping but Vaniman did not
appear at the window. The Squire did not venture to tap again. "He must
be pretty well taken up with his work," he suggested to Xoa when they
were on their way. "That's where we get the saying, 'Deaf as an adder.'"

Oblivious to all sounds, bent over his task, Vaniman gave to the
exasperating puzzle all the concentration he could muster.

The play that evening at Town Hall dragged after the fashion of amateur
shows. The management of the sets and the properties consumed much
time. There were mishaps. One of these accidents had to do with the
most ambitious scene of the piece, a real brook--the main feature of
the final, grand table