herbaceous borders would spring up on all sides. Mr. Johnson's visits
and his council, though at first resented, had at length grown a source
of pure delight to Halcyone; she reveled in the blooms of the delicate
begonias and salvias and other blossoms which she had never seen before.
Mr. Carlyon, although desiring solitude, appreciated a beautiful and
cultivated one, and the orchard house was now becoming a very
comfortable bachelor's home.

The day was much cooler than it had been of late. There was a fresh
breeze though the sun shone. John Derringham wandered down to the apple
tree and thence to the gap, and through it and on into the park. His
walk was for pleasure, and aimless as to destination, and presently he
sat down under a low-spreading oak and looked at the house--La Sarthe
Chase. A beautiful view of it could be obtained from there, and it
interested him--and from that his thoughts came to Halcyone and her
strange, quaint little personality, and he stretched himself out and
putting his hands under his head he looked up into the dense foliage of
the tree above him--and there his eyes met two grave, quiet ones peering
down from a mass of green, and he saw slender brown legs drawn up on a
broad branch, and a scrap of blue cotton frock.

"Good morning," Halcyone said quite composedly, "don't make a noise,
please, or rustle--the mother doe is just coming out of the copse with
her new fawn."

"How on earth did you get up there?" he asked, surprised.

"I swung myself from the lower branch on the other side; it is quite
easy--would you like to come up, too? There is plenty of room--and then
we could be sure the doe would not see you and she might peep out again.