the dusky stairways of that old and solitary dwelling.

When Roger returned, fresh from the rough companionship of school, Sunny
seemed to him a creature of some better race than his own. The Shadow
vanished, for he forgot it in his new devotion to Sunny. Nothing did he
leave undone to please her wayward fancies. In those hot summer-days,
he carried her to a little brook that rippled across the meadow, and,
sitting with her in his arms on the large smooth stones that divided
those shallow waters, held her carefully while she splashed her tiny
dimpled feet in the cool ripples, or grasped vainly at the blue-winged
dragon-flies sailing past, on languid, airy pinions, just beyond her
reach. Or he gathered heaps of daisies for the child to toss into the
shining stream, and see the pale star-like blossoms float smoothly down
till some eddy caught them in its sparkling whirl, and, drenching the
frail, helpless leaves, cast them on the farther shore and went its
careless way. Or he told her, in the afternoons, under some wide
apple-tree, wonderful stories of giants and naughty boys, till she fell
asleep on the sweet hay, where the curious grasshoppers peered at her
with round horny eyes, and velvet-bodied spiders scurried across her
fair curls with six-legged speed, and the robin eyed her from a bough
above with wistful glances, till Roger must needs carry her tenderly out
of their neighborhood to his mother's gentle care.

All this guard and guidance Sunny repaid with her only treasure, love.
She left her pet kitten in its gayest antics to sit on Roger's knee; she
went to sleep at night nestled against his arm; every little dainty that
she gathered from garden or field was shared with him; and no pleasure
that did not include Roger could tempt Sunny to be pleased.

For a while the unconscious charm endured; absorbed in his darling,