parasol into his hand.

Before he could move, Vic Burleigh leaped out from behind the cedars,
and, picking up a sharp-edged bit of limestone, tipped his hand
dexterously and sent it clean as a knife cut across the space.
It struck the snake just below the head, half severing it from the body.
Another leap and Burleigh had kicked the whole writhing mass--
it would have measured five feet--off the stone into the sunflower
stalks and long grasses of the steep slope.

"How did you ever dare?" Elinor asked.

"Oh, he's not poison; he just doesn't belong up here."

The bluntness of timidity was in Vic's answer, but the strength
and musical depth of his resonant voice was almost startling.

"There is no Eden without a serpent, Miss Elinor," Professor Burgess
said lightly.

"Nor a serpent without some sort of Eden built around it.
The thing's mate will be along after it pretty soon.
Look out for it down there. The best place to catch it is
right behind its ears," came the boy's quick response.

Burleigh looked back defiantly at Burgess as he disappeared indoors.
And the antagonism born in the meeting of these two men in the morning
took on a tiny degree of strength in the afternoon.

"What a wonderful voice, Vincent. It makes one want to hear