ur knew perfectly well who
she was, but something about her so dazed and bewildered him that for a
moment he could not speak, but stared at her with the hungry, wistful
look of one longing for something just within his reach, but still
unattainable.

'Do you like me?' Jerry asked at last.

'Like you?' he replied. 'Yes. Why did you not come to me sooner?'

And, stooping, he kissed the cherry-stained mouth as he had never kissed
a child before.

Sitting down upon the lounge, he took her in his lap and said to her
again:

'Who are you, and where did you come from? I know your name is Jerry,
which is a strange one for a girl, and I know you live with Mrs.
Crawford, but before that night where did you live? Where did you come
from?'

'Out of the carpet-bag in the Tramp House. I told you that once,' Jerry
said. 'Harold found me. I am his little girl. He is out in the cherry
tree, and said I must not come up, because you were crazy and would hurt
me. You won't hurt me, will you? And be you crazy?'

'Hurt you? No,' he answered, as he parted the rings of her hair from her
low brow. 'I don't know whether I am crazy or not They say so, and
perhaps I am, when my head is full of bumble-bees.'

'Oh--h!' Jerry gasped, drawing back from him. 'Can they get out? And
will they sting?'

Arthur burst into a merry laugh, the first he had known since he came
back to Shannondale. Jerry was doing him good. There was something very
soothing in the touch of the little warm hands he held in his, and
something puzzling and fascinating, too, in the face of the child. He
did not think of a likeness to any one; he only knew that he felt drawn
toward her in a most unaccountable manner, and found himself wondering
greatly who she was.

'Harold told me there were pictures and marble people up here with
nothing on, and everything, and that's why I comed--that and to bring
you some cherries. I like pictures. Can I see them?' Jerry said.

'Yes, you shall see them,' Arthur replied; and he led her into the room
where Gretchen's picture looked at them from the window.

'Oh, my!' Jerry exclaimed, with bated breath, 'Ain't she lovely! Is she
God's sister?' and folding her hands together, she stood before the
picture as reverently as a devout Catholic stands before a Madonna.

It was some time since Jerry had spoken a word of German, but as she
stood before Gretchen's picture old memories seemed to revive, and with
them the German word for _prett