. He taught her to call
him brother and he spoke to her as "little sister." This was
particularly blinding to Marcia Lowe.

"Brother and sister in the broad human sense," pleaded Lans, and so the
net drew close around little Cyn, and she did not struggle, because the
mesh was so open and free that it did not chafe the delicate nature nor
stunt the yet blind soul.

At the end of the third week Crothers, in fatherly manner, suggested to
Lans that he was compromising Cynthia. So considerately and humanely
did the man speak of this that Lans could take no offence, particularly
as Crothers just then had brought their common interests to such a pass
that to resent anything would have been fatal. A very beautiful and
many-coloured bubble was well in sight!

"You see," Crothers explained, "them men up to Greeley's store are a
right evil lot. Knowing that Cynthia Walden was a nameless waif when
old Miss Ann adopted her, they cannot believe a right smart feller like
you has honest motives and they are getting ugly."

Lans had heard the report of Cynthia's early childhood; the girl
herself had sweetly and pathetically referred to it--and they thought
he was that kind, eh? Well, he would show them! Having accepted the
fate of the man on a desert island, Lans Treadwell meant to treat the
natives he found there, fairly and nobly. In his mind he had cut
himself adrift forever from the old life and its claims; Cynthia was
the most attractive little savage on his isolated, safety isle--he
would claim her virtuously and bravely; he would train her; educate her
to be no unworthy mate for him in his god-like sacrifice for his family
honour.

Never had Lans Treadwell been so dramatic nor such a fool, but he had
caught little Cyn, and before she realized what had happened or why she
had permitted it to happen, she drove away with Treadwell over the
hills one day to see some land Crothers had urged him to look at and, a
storm overtaking them, they were delayed in an old cabin where they
sought shelter over night and then and there Lans brought her to see
that for all their sakes they should be married before going home.

"Married?" gasped Cynthia, as if the word were foreign; "married! me,
little Cyn? Why, only _women_ marry!"

"And you are a woman, sweet!" Even then Lans did not touch her, though
she looked more divine with her big eyes shining and the blessed smile
parting her lips than he had ever seen her.

"I--a woman