nd finally coming to the giant fog, rent it apart
by handfuls as you pluck feathers from a goose, and hurled it this way
and that, until once more the sky and land could look each other in the
face. Then the great wind laughed and ceased. For a long time Margaret
looked down the cleared face of the river, but there was no trace
of Aladdin, and in life but one comfort: the sun was hot and she was
getting warm.

After a time, in the woods directly behind where she sat hoping and
fearing and trying to dry her tears, a gun sounded like an exclamation
of hope. Had Aladdin by any incredible circumstance returned so soon?
Mindful of his warning not to stray from where she was, Margaret stood
up and called in a shrill little voice

"Here I am! Here I am!"

Silence in the woods immediately behind where Margaret stood hoping and
fearing!

"Here I am!" she cried. And it had been piteous to hear, so small and
shrill was the voice.

Presently, though much farther off, sounded the merry yapping bark of
a little dog, and again, but this time like an echo of itself, the
exclamation of hope--hope deferred.

"Here I am! Here--I--am!" called Margaret.

Then there was a long silence--so long that it seemed as if nothing in
the world could have been so long. Margaret sat down gasping. The sun
rose higher, the river ran on, and hope flew away. And just as hope
had gone for good, the merry yapping of the dog broke out so near that
Margaret jumped, and bang went the gun--like a promise of salvation.
Instantly she was on her feet with her shrill,

"Here I am! Here I am!"

And this time came back a lusty young voice crying:

"I'm coming!"

And hard behind the voice leaves shook, and a boy came striding into
the sunlight. In one hand he trailed a gun, and at his heels trotted
a waggish spaniel of immense importance and infinitesimal size. In his
other hand the boy carried by the legs a splendid cock-grouse, ruffled
and hunger-compelling. The boy, perhaps two years older than Aladdin,
was big and strong for his age, and bore his shining head like a young
wood-god.

Margaret ran to him, telling her story as she went, but so incoherently
that when she reached him she had to stop and begin over again.

"Then Senator St. John is your father?" said the boy at length. "You
know, he's a great friend of my father's. My father's name is Peter
Manners, and he used to be a congressman for New York. Are you hungry?"

Margaret could only loo