and held his tight lest he should move or rustle a leaf.

"See," she whispered right in his ear. "She will cross to the other side
by the stream--and oh! there is the fawn! Is he not the dearest baby
angel you have ever seen--!"

And the doe, feeling herself safe, trotted by, followed by a minute son
in pale drab velvet hardly a month old.

The pair in the tree watched them breathlessly until they had entered
the copse again beyond the bend, and then Halcyone said:

"That makes six--and perhaps there are more. Oh! how I hope the Long Man
will not see them!"

John Derringham did not let go her hand at once; there was something
soft and pleasant in the touch of the cool little fingers.

"I want to hear about everything," he said. "Tell me of the Long
Man--and the fawns, and why there are only six. I am having the happiest
morning I have had for years."

So Halcyone began. She glossed a good deal over the facts she had told
Mr. Carlyon upon the subject because she did not feel she knew this
stranger well enough to let him into her aunts' private affairs--so she
turned the interest to the deer themselves, and they chatted on about
all sorts of animals and their ways, and John Derringham was entranced
and felt quite aggrieved when she said it was getting late and she must
go back to the house for her early dinner. He swung himself down from
the tree by the high branch with ease and stood ready to catch her, but