divine recklessness that is the very sap of
life. The future, save of the immediate hours to come, lost its power
over her. The blue and white beauty of the sky proclaimed all things
possible for the strong; and the air was vibrant with the sweet music
of bells, calling her to happiness. She was going to meet happiness, to
meet love--to meet Ditmar! The trolley which she took in Faber Street,
though lagging in its mission, seemed an agent of that happiness as it
left the city behind it and wound along the heights beside the tarvia
roadway above the river, bright glimpses of which she caught through
the openings in the woods. And when she looked out of the window on her
right she beheld on a little forested rise a succession of tiny "camps"
built by residents of Hampton whose modest incomes could not afford more
elaborate summer places; camps of all descriptions and colours, with
queer names that made her smile: "The Cranny," "The Nook," "Snug
Harbour," "Buena Vista,"--of course,--which she thought pretty,
though she did not know its meaning; and another, in German, equally
perplexing, "Klein aber Mein." Though the windows of these places were
now boarded up, though the mosquito netting still clung rather dismally
to the porches, they were mutely suggestive of contentment and domestic
joy.

Scarcely had she alighted from the car at the rendezvous he had
mentioned, beside the now deserted boathouse where in the warm weather
the members of the Hampton Rowing Club disported themselves, when she
saw an automobile approaching--and recognized it as the gay "roadster"
Ditmar had exhibited to her that summer afternoon by the canal; and
immediately Ditmar himself, bringing it to a stop and leaping from it,
stood before her in the sunlight, radiating, as it seemed, more sunlight
still. With his clipped, blond moustache and his straw-coloured hair--as
yet but slightly grey at the temples--he looked a veritable conquering
berserker in his huge coat of golden fur. Never had he appeared to
better advantage.

"I was waiting for you," he said, "I saw you in the car." Turning to
the automobile, he stripped the tissue paper from a cluster of dark red
roses with the priceless long stems of which Lise used to rave when she
worked in the flower store. And he held the flowers against her suit her
new suit she had worn for this meeting.

"Oh," she cried, taking a deep, intoxicating breath of their fragrance.
"You brought these--for me?"