t? How would you
like to have her pour your coffee for you to-morrow, my boy? How would
it seem to have such pleasant company all the rest of your life? Pretty
cheerful, eh?"

When Miss Sherwood passed the editor the apple-butter, the casual,
matter-of-course way she did it entranced him in a strange, exquisite
wonderment. He did not set the dish down when she put it in his hand,
but held it straight out before him, just looking at it, until Mr.
Willetts had a dangerous choking fit, for which Minnie was very proud of
Lige; no one could have suspected that it was the veil of laughter. When
Helen told John he really must squeeze a lemon into his iced tea, he
felt that his one need in life was to catch her up in his arms and run
away with her, not anywhere in particular, but just run and run and run
away.

After dinner they went out to the veranda and the gentlemen smoked. The
judge set his chair down on the ground, tilted back in it with his feet
on the steps, and blew a wavery domed city up in the air. He called it
solid comfort. He liked to sit out from under the porch roof, he said;
he wanted to see more of the sky. The others moved their chairs down to
join him in the celestial vision. There had blown across the heaven a
feathery, thin cloud or two, but save for these, there was nothing but
glorious and tender, brilliant blue. It seemed so clear and close one
marvelled the little church spire in the distance did not pierce it;
yet, at the same time, the eye ascended miles and miles into warm,
shimmering ether. Far away two buzzards swung slowly at anchor, half-way
to the sun.

"'O bright, translucent, cerulean hue,
Let my wide wings drift on in you,'"

said Harkless, pointing them out to Helen.

"You seem to get a good deal of fun out of this kind of weather,"
observed Lige, as he wiped his brow and shifted his chair out of the
sun.

"I expect you don't get such skies as this up in Rouen," said the judge,
looking at the girl from between half-closed eyelids.

"It's the same Indiana sky, I think," she answered.

"I guess maybe in the city you don't see as much of it, or think as much
about it. Yes, they're the Indiana skies," the old man went on.

Skies as blue
As the eyes of children when they smile at you.'

"There aren't any others anywhere that ever seemed much like them to
me. They've been company for me all my life. I don't think there are any
others h