ower of them waited for
the musicians at the end of the hall. Through the whole house wreathed
the sweet rose-scent, mingled with the frailer fragrance of the
wildings. John Valiant drew a single great red beauty from its brethren
and fastened it in his button-hole.

Out in the kitchens Cassandra's egg-beating clattered like a watchman's
rattle, while Aunt Daphne put the finishing touches to an array of
lighter edibles destined to grace the long table on the rear porch, now
walled in with snow-white muslin and hung with candle-lusters. Under the
trees Uncle Jefferson was even then experimenting with various punch
compounds, and a delicious aroma of vanilla came to Valiant's nostrils
together with Aunt Daphne's wrathful voice:

"Heah, yo' Greenie Simms! Whah yo' gwine?"

"Ain' gwine nowhah. Ah's done been whah Ah's gwine."

"Yo' set down dat o'ange er Ah'll smack yo' bardaciously ovah! Ef yo'
_steals_, what gwineter become ob yo' _soul_?"

"Don' know nuffin' 'bout mah soul," responded the ebony materialist.
"But Ah knows Ah got er body, 'cause Ah buttons et up e'vy day, en Ah
lakes et plump."

"Yo' go back en wuk fo' yo' quahtah yankin' on dat ar ice-cream
freezah," decreed Aunt Daphne exasperatedly, "er yo' don' git er _smell_
ter-night. Yo' heah dat!"

The threat proved efficacious, for Greenie, muttering sullenly that she
"didn' nebbah feel no sky-lark in de ebenin'," returned to her labors.

* * * * *

The Red Road, as Valiant's car passed, was dotted with straggling
pedestrians: humble country folk who trudged along the grassy foot-path
with no sullen regard for the swift cars and comfortable carriages that
left them behind; sturdy barefooted children who called shrilly after
him, and happy-go-lucky negro youths clad in their best with Sunday
shoes dangling over their shoulders, slouching regardlessly in the
dust--all bound for the same Mecca, which presently rose before him, a
gateway of painted canvas proclaiming the field to which it opened
Runnymede.

This was a spacious level meadow into which debouched the ravine on
whose rim he had stood with Shirley on that unforgettable day. But its
stake-and-ridered fence enclosed now no mere stretch of ill-kept sward.
Busy scythes, rollers and grass-cutters from the Country Club had
smoothed and shaven a rectangle in its center till it lay like a carpet
of crushed green velvet, set in an expanse of life-everlasting and pale
budd