which drove a film of cloud across the
stars and bore a hint of rain in its freshness. The rain itself
pattering presently through the forest fell upon the huddled figure of
a girl who lay face downward upon the ground among the trees.

She lay inert, her head pillowed upon her arm, face to face with the
unspeakable shadow that had haunted Carl. Not married. Aunt Agatha
had said, but just a mother! Now the pitiful fragments of a hallowed
shrine lay mockingly at her feet. How scornfully she had flashed at
Carl!

Diane quivered and lay very still, torn by the bitter irony of it.

And the Indian mother! Carl had known and Ronador. She had caught a
startled look in the eyes of each at the Sherrill _fete_. Every wild
instinct, if she had but heeded the warning, had pointed the way; the
childhood escapade in the forest, the tomboy pranks of riding and
running and swimming that had horrified Aunt Agatha to the point of
tears, and later the persistent call of the open country.

What wonder if the soft, musical tongue of the Seminole had come
lightly to her lips? What wonder if Indian instincts had driven her
forth to the wild? What wonder if the nameless stir of atavism beneath
a Seminole wigwam had frightened her into flight. Indian instincts,
Indian grace, Indian stoicism and courage, Indian keenness and
hearing--all of these had come to her from the Indian mother with the
blood of white men in her veins.

But the stain of illegitimacy--

That brought the girl's proud head down again with a strangled sob of
grief. Shaking pitifully, she fell forward unconscious upon the ground.

Some one was calling. There was rain and a lantern.

Diane stirred.

"Diane! Diane!" called the voice of Philip.

At the memory of Philip and Arcadia, Diane choked and lay very still.

"Diane!" The lantern shone now in her face and Philip was kneeling
beside her, his face whiter than her own.

"Great God!" said Philip and stared into her haunted eyes with infinite
compassion.

But Philip, as he frequently said, was preeminently a "practician,"
wherefore he gently covered the girl with his coat, busied himself with
the lantern and, for various reasons, sought to create a general
atmosphere of commonplace reality.

"Your aunt sent me," he said at length. "She's awfully upset."

"She told you?"

"Yes."

"Of--of the Indian mother?"

"I knew," said Philip. "Carl told me. I withheld it this morning
purposely. Why f