g to have it out with my father, this
afternoon."

She nodded slowly.

"Yes, you may as well. It's about time."

He turned away and started down the narrow road through the town. She
stood looking after him for a moment; then she called,--

"Mayn't I go, too, Allyn?"

"If you want to. I sha'n't be back in time for the bathing hour, though,"
he answered; but his eyes belied the scant cordiality of his words.

For more than an hour, they sat on the high bluff that juts seaward at
the south of the town. On the one hand, the sea stretched away, its deep
sapphire blue only broken by the diagonal white line that marked the
rips; on the other were the treeless moors looking in the changing lights
like a vast expanse of pinkish brown plush. Directly at their feet, the
little bowl of Kidd's Pond lay among its rushes like a turquoise ringed
about with malachite; beyond it was the grey village, and beyond again,
the lighthouse whose tall white tower by day and whose flashing light at
night are the beacons which seem to welcome the wanderers of the summer
colony, whenever their steps are turned back to Quantuck.

At length, Cicely rose to her feet.

"We must go, Allyn. Here is the noon train now, and we shall be late
to dinner."

But the boy did not stir. He sat with his elbows on his knees, his chin
resting on the back of his clasped fingers, while his eyes followed the
slow approach of the primitive little Quantuck train. Cicely waited for a
moment. Then she came back to his side once more and dropped down on the
coarse moorland grass.

"Allyn," she said gravely; "it isn't always easy to know what to do; at
least, I don't think it is. The future seems so far off, when we try to
plan about it. But papa used to tell me that, as long as I did the next
thing in order and did it hard and carefully, without trying to save
myself any work or to sneak, the rest of things would take care of
themselves. It sounds pretty prosy; but I rather think after all it may
be true. It is a good deal more romantic to plan what great things we'll
do when we are grown up; but I never noticed that planning helped on
much. When I began on my music, I used to dream lots of dreams about the
concerts I'd give; but all the good it did was to make me lose count in
my exercises, so I gave up dreaming and took to scales instead, and then
I began to get on a little better." She paused for a minute; then she
went on gayly, "And the moral of that is, st