rom her excited lips.

Because she had suddenly realised that he was even more wonderful than
she had expected or remembered, and that she did not know him at
all--that she had no knowledge of this tall, handsome, well-built
young fellow with his sunburnt features and his air of smiling
aloofness and of graceful assurance, almost fascinating and a trifle
disturbing.

Which had made the girl rather grave and timid, uncertain of the
estimation in which he might hold her; no longer so sure of any
encouragement from him in her perfectly obvious attitude of a friend
of former days.

And so, shyly admiring, uncertain, inclined to warm response at any
advance from this wonderful young man, the girl had been trying to
adjust herself to this new incarnation of a certain James Neeland who
had won her gratitude and who had awed her, too, from the time when,
as a little girl, she had first beheld him.

She lifted her golden-grey eyes to him; a little unexpected sensation
not wholly unpleasant checked her speech for a moment.

This was odd, even unaccountable. Such awkwardness, such disquieting
and provincial timidity wouldn't do.

"Would you mind telling me a little about Brookhollow?" she ventured.

Certainly he would tell her. He laid aside his plate and tea cup and
told her of his visits there when he had walked over from Neeland's
Mills in the pleasant summer weather.

Nothing had changed, he assured her; mill-dam and pond and bridge, and
the rushing creek below were exactly as she knew them; her house stood
there at the crossroads, silent and closed in the sunshine, and under
the high moon; pickerel and sunfish still haunted the shallow pond;
partridges still frequented the alders and willows across her pasture;
fireflies sailed through the summer night; and the crows congregated
in the evening woods and talked over the events of the day.

"And my cat? You wrote that you would take care of Adoniram."

"Adoniram is an aged patriarch and occupies the place of honour in my
father's house," he said.

"He is well?"

"Oh, yes. He prefers his food cut finely, that is all."

"I don't suppose he will live very long."

"He's pretty old," admitted Neeland.

She sighed and looked out of the window at the kitten in the garden.
And, after an interval of silence:

"Our plot in the cemetery--is it--pretty?"

"It is beautiful," he said, "under the great trees. It is well cared
for. I had them plant the shrubs and flowers