nus of the track, and then with Blix set
off down the long board walk through the tunnel of overhanging
evergreens.

The day could not have been more desirable. It was a little after ten
of a Monday morning, Condy's weekly holiday. The air was neither cool
nor warm, effervescent merely, brisk and full of the smell of grass and
of the sea. The sky was a speckless sheen of pale blue. To their
right, and not far off, was the bay, blue as indigo. Alcatraz seemed
close at hand; beyond was the enormous green, red, and purple pyramid
of Tamalpais climbing out of the water, head and shoulders above the
little foothills, and looking out to the sea and to the west.

The Reservation itself was delightful. There were rows of the
officers' houses, all alike, drawn up in lines like an assembly of the
staff; there were huge barracks, most like college dormitories; and on
their porches enlisted men in shirt sleeves and overalls were cleaning
saddles, and polishing the brass of head-stalls and bridles, whistling
the while or smoking corn-cob pipes. Here on the parade-ground a
soldier, his coat and vest removed, was batting grounders and flies to
a half-dozen of his fellows. Over by the stables, strings of horses,
all of the same color, were being curried and cleaned. A young
lieutenant upon a bicycle spun silently past. An officer came from his
front gate, his coat unbuttoned and a briar in his teeth. The walks
and roads were flanked with lines of black-painted cannon-balls;
inverted pieces of abandoned ordnance stood at corners. From a
distance came the mellow snarling of a bugle.

Blix and Condy had planned a long walk for that day. They were to go
out through the Presidio Reservation, past the barracks and officers'
quarters, and on to the old fort at the Golden Gate. Here they would
turn and follow the shore-line for a way, then strike inland across the
hills for a short half-mile, and regain the city and the street-car
lines by way of the golf-links. Condy had insisted upon wearing his
bicycle outfit for the occasion, and, moreover, carried a little
satchel, which, he said, contained a pair of shoes.

But Blix was as sweet as a rose that morning, all in tailor-made black
but for the inevitable bands of white satin wrapped high and tight
about her neck. The St. Bernard dog-collar did duty as a belt. She
had disdained a veil, and her yellow hair was already blowing about her
smooth pink cheeks. She walked at his