very breath put courage into
her heart.

She looked down and saw the yellow cat, stopping, with one lifted
paw, his green, lamplike eyes fixed unwaveringly on hers.

"Why, it's you, Red Rufus!" she whispered, "when did we come here? I
don't remember--"

A bat whirred by: the cat pricked his ears.

"I don't believe we're here at all, Red Rufus," she whispered again.
"We're just dreaming--at least, I am. I s'pose you're only in my
dream. If I was really here, I'd be frightened to death, prob'ly,
but if it's just a dream, I think it's lovely. Let's go on. I never
had a dream like this--it seems so real, doesn't it, Rufus?"

They went on aimlessly up the road. Quaint little night sounds began
now to make themselves heard: now and then a drowsy twitter from the
sleeping nests, now and then a distant owl hoot. A sudden gust of
honeysuckle, so strong that it was like a friendly, fragrant body
flung against her, halted her for a moment, and while she paused,
sniffing ecstatically, the low murmur of voices caught her ear.

The honeysuckle ran riot over an old stone wall, followed an arching
gateway at the foot of a winding path that led to a lighted house on
a knoll above, and flung screening tendrils over an entwined pair
that paused just inside the gate. The girl's white, loose sleeves
fell back from her round arms as she flung them up about her tall
lover's neck; his dark head bent low over hers, their lips met, and
they hung entranced in the bowery archway.

For a moment Caroline watched them with frank curiosity. Then
something woke and stirred in her, faint and vague, but alive now,
and she turned away her eyes, blushing hot in the cool moonlight.

The soft tones of their good-night died into broken whispers; parted
from his white lady, he started on for a few, irresolute steps, then
flung about suddenly and walked back toward the house, after a low,
happy protest. The cooing of some drowsy pigeons in the stable on
the other side of the road carried on the lovers' language long
after they were out of earshot, and confused itself with them in
Caroline's mind.

She wandered on, intoxicated with the mild, spacious night, the dewy
freedom of the fields, the delicious pressure of the warm, velvet
air against her body. Red Rufus purred as he went, rejoicing with
his vagabond comrade. Just how or when she began to know that she
was not asleep, just why the knowledge did not alarm her, it would
be hard to say. But when