irl cries, "will you bring her up to the little
cottage over yonder? You can just see the pointed roof. It is my home."

"You are Miss St. Vincent?" Grandon exclaims in surprise. He does not
know quite what he has expected, but she is very different from any
thought of his concerning her.

"Yes." She utters this with a simple, fearless dignity that would do
credit to a woman of fashion. "Her hands had better be washed and her
arm wrapped up. They will feel more comfortable."

"Thank you." Then he rises with Cecil in his arms, and makes a gesture
to Miss St. Vincent, who settles her wide-brimmed hat that has slipped
back, and goes on as a leader. She is so light, supple, and graceful!
Her plain, loosely fitting dress allows the slim figure the utmost
freedom. She is really taller than she looks, though she would be
petite beside his sisters. Her foot and ankle are perfect, and the
springy step is light as a fawn's.

This, then, is the girl whose future they have been discussing, whose
hand has been disposed of in marriage as arbitrarily as if she were a
princess of royal blood. If Eugene only _would_ marry her! Fortune
seems quite sure now, and he is not the man ever to work for it. It
must come to him.

Once or twice Miss St. Vincent looks back, blushing brightly. She has a
natural soft pink in her cheeks that seems like the heart of a rose,
and the blush deepens the exquisite tint. They enter the shaded path,
and she goes around to the side porch, where the boards have been
scrubbed white as snow.

"O Denise," she exclaims, "will you get a basin of water and some old
linen? This little girl has fallen and scratched her arms badly." Then,
with a sudden accession of memory, she continues, "I believe it is the
gentleman who has been to see papa."

"Mr. Grandon!" Denise says in amaze.

"Yes. Your young mistress has saved my little girl from what might have
been a sad accident." And he stands Cecil on the speckless floor.

Miss St. Vincent throws off her hat. Denise brings some water in a
small, old silver basin, and rummages for the linen. Grandon turns up
the sleeve of his daughter's dress, and now Cecil begins to cry and
shrink away from Denise.

"Let me," says the young girl, with that unconscious self-possession so
becoming to her, and yet so far removed from boldness. "Now you are
going to be very brave," she says to the child. "You know how you held
on by the tree and did just as I told you, and now, afte