like a man dreaming, when she does not smile on me and speak
to me!"

Verty's head drooped, and his cheeks reddened with the ingenuous blush
of boyhood. Then he raised his head, and murmured, with a smile, which
made his face beautiful--so full of light and joy was it.

"Yes--I think I am in love with Redbud--and she does not think it
wrong, I am sure--oh, I don't think she will think it wrong in me, and
turn against me, only because I love her!"

Having arrived at this conclusion, Verty went along smiling, and
admiring the splendid tints of the foliage--drinking in the fresh,
breezy air of morning, and occasionally listening for the cries of
game--of deer, and turkey, pheasants, and the rest. He heard with his
quick ear many of these sounds: the still croak of the turkey, the
drumming of the pheasant; more than once saw disappear on a distant
hill, like a flying shadow, the fallow deer, which he had so often
chased and shot. But on that morning he could not leave his path to
follow the wild deer, or slay the lesser game, of which the copses
were full. Mastered by a greater passion even than hunting, Verty drew
near Apple Orchard--making signs with his head to the deer to go on
their way, and wholly oblivious of pheasants.

He reached Apple Orchard just as the sun soared redly up above the
distant forest; and the old homestead waked up with it. Morning always
smiled on Apple Orchard, and the brilliant flush seemed, there, more
brilliant still; while all the happy breezes flying over it seemed to
regret their destiny which led them far away to other clouds.

Verty always stopped for a moment on his way to and from Winchester,
to bid the inmates good morning; and these hours had come to be the
bright sunny spots in days otherwise full of no little languor. For
when was Daymon merry and light-hearted, separated from his love? It
is still the bright moment of meeting which swallows up all other
thoughts--around which the musing heart clusters all its joy and
hope--which is looked forward to and dreamed over, with longing,
dreamy, yet excited happiness. And this is the reason why the most
fatal blow which the young heart can suffer is a sudden warning that
there must be no more meetings. No more! when it dreams of and
clings to that thought of meeting, as the life and vital blood
of to-morrow!--when the heart is liquid--the eyes moist with
tenderness--the warp of thought woven of golden thread--at such a
moment for th