told him of that which was seething in her heart.

"What does it matter, Jerry-Jo? All my life, ever since I can remember,
I have been growing surely to what is now near at hand. I cannot abide my
father; nor can he find comfort in me. Why should I darken the lives of
my parents and have no life of my own? The lure of the States has always
been in my thought and now it calls near and loud."

McAlpin stared helplessly at her, and her beauty, enhanced by her unusual
garments, moved him unwholesomely.

"What you mean?" he muttered.

"Only this: It would be no strange thing did a boy start for the States.
A little money, a ticket on a steamer, and--pouf! Off the boys and men
go to make their lives. Well, then, some day you will--find me gone,
Jerry-Jo. Gone to make my life. Will you miss me?"

This question caused McAlpin to stop paddling.

"You won't be--let!" he murmured; "you--a girl!"

"I, a girl!" Priscilla laughed scornfully. "You will see. This day, after
I have thanked him up yonder, I am going to ask his mother to help me get
away. Surely a lady such as she could help me. I will not ask much of
her, only the guiding hand to a safe place where I can--live! Oh! can you
understand how all my life I have been smothered and stifled? I often
wonder what sort I will be--out there! I'm willing to suffer while I
learn, but Jerry-Jo"--and here the excited voice paused--"I have a
strange feeling of--myself! I sometimes feel as if there were two of me,
the one holding, demanding, and protecting the other. I will not have men
always making my life and shielding me; the woman of me will have its
way. Men and boys never know this feeling."

And Jerry-Jo could, of course, understand nothing of this, but the thing
he had set out to do, more in rude, brutish fun than anything else,
assumed graver purpose. A new and ugly look grew in his bold eyes, a
sinister smile on his red mouth, which showed the points of his white,
fang-like teeth. But Priscilla, too absorbed with her own thoughts, did
not notice.

It was four o'clock when the canoe touched the landing spot of Far Hill
Place, and Priscilla sprang out.

"I'll bide here; don't be long," said McAlpin.

But Priscilla paused and glanced up at the sky.

"It's darkening," she faltered, a shyness overcoming her. "I
smell--thunder. Don't you think you better come up with me Jerry-Jo?
Suppose they are not at home?"

"They'll be back soon in that case, and as for a shower,