n as they are seen now."

"Yes, that's what I wanted to say, but you always know how to find the
right words."

"Perhaps," he said. "Things never look just the same tomorrow, but they
may look--well, nicer--or--I can't always find the right word. Suppose we
walk to the graves after lunch and have a good talk." It was so agreed.

They were never quite free from the chance of being sent on errands, and
as Aunt Ann showed signs they well knew, they slipped away quietly and
were gone before the ever-busy lady had ready a basket of contributions
to the comfort of a sick woman in the village. They crossed the garden
and were lost to view in the woods before Leila spoke. "We just did it.
Billy will have to go." They laughed merrily at their escape.

"Just think, John, how long it is since you came. It seems years. Oh, you
_were_ a queer boy! I just hated you."

"I do suppose, Leila, I must have looked odd with that funny cap and the
cane--"

"And the way you looked when I told you about swinging on the gate. I
hadn't done that for--oh, two years. What did you think of me?"

"I thought you were very rude, and then--oh, Leila! when you came up out
of the drift--" He hesitated.

"Oh, go on; I don't mind--not now."

"I thought you beautiful with all that splendid hair on the snow."

"Oh, John! How silly!" Whether or not she was unusually good to look at
had hardly ever before occurred to her. She flushed slightly, pleased and
wondering, with a new seed of gentle vanity planted in her simple nature,
a child on the threshold of the womanly inheritance of maidenhood.

Then he said gravely, "It is wonderful to me how we have changed. I shall
miss you. To think you are the only girl I ever played with, and now when
you come back at Christmas--"

"I am not to come back then, John. I am to stay with my uncles in
Baltimore and not come home until next June."

"You will be a young lady in long skirts and your hair tucked up. It's
dreadful."

"Can't be helped, John. You will look after Lucy, and write to me."

"And you will write to me, Leila?"

"If I may. Aunt says they are very strict. But I shall write to Aunt Ann,
of course."

"That won't be the same."

"No."

They walked on in silence for a little while, the girl gazing idly at
the tall trees, the lad feeling strangely aware, freshly aware, as
they moved, of the great blue eyes and of the sun-shafts falling on
the abundant hair she swept back from time to time w