t was half joy. "I--I must go, Gerald,
indeed!" she said, faintly.

"You must not go," said Gerald, gravely. "It is not all play, Margaret,
between you and me. My cap and bells are off now, and you must hear what
I have to say."

Margaret, still hesitating, looked up in his face, and saw something
there that brought the sweet color flooding over her neck and brow, so
swift and hot that instinctively she hid her face in her hands.

But gently, tenderly, Gerald Merryweather drew the slender hands away,
and held them close in his own.

"My dearest girl," said the young man, "my dearest love, you are not
afraid of me? Sit down by me; sit down, my Margaret, and let me tell you
what my heart has been saying ever since the day I first saw you."

So dear Margaret sat down, perhaps because she could hardly stand, and
listened. And the black cattle listened, too, and so did the fish-hawk
overhead, and the little birds peeping from their nest in the birch wood
close at hand; but none of them ever told what Gerald said.

CHAPTER XVII.

THE SNOWY OWL

"I THINK it is a horrid bother, if you want to know!" said Willy.

"Willy Merryweather! aren't you ashamed of yourself? I never heard
anything so odious, when we are all so happy, and everything is so
perfectly lovely. I don't see what you mean."

"I don't care, it _is_ a bother. Nothing is the way it used to be; it's
all nothing but spooning, all over the lot."

"I should not think you would use vulgar expressions, anyhow, Willy."

"'Spooning' isn't vulgar," said Willy, sulkily. "I've heard Pa say it,
so there! And--look here, Kitty! Of course, it's all corking, and so on,
and anyhow, girls like that kind of fuss; but it does spoil everything,
I tell you. Why, Pa couldn't get a crew for the war canoe yesterday. He
wanted to go to Pine Cove--at least I did, awfully, and he said all
right, so we would; and then Jerry was off with Margaret in the
_Keewaydin_, and Bell and Jack were out in the woods fiddling, and Peggy
and Phil--I say, Kitty! You don't suppose _they_ are going to get
spoony, do you?"

Kitty looked very wise, and pursed her lips and nodded her head with an
air of deep mystery.

"You don't!" repeated Willy, looking aghast.

"Hush, Willy!" said Kitty. "Don't say a word! don't breathe it to
anybody! I hope--I _think_ they are!"

"What a mean, horrid shame!" cried Willy, indignantly. "I do think it is
disgusting."

His sister turned on him with fl