screened her from its tingle. Her eyes gazed out over the valley at their
feet.

"This is the edge of the world," she said softly. "Do you remember your
little verses about the death of the stars?" She turned and raised her
eyes to his. "We are holding a death-watch beside them now as the moon
comes up over the ridge there. When I read the poem I felt breathless to
get out somewhere high up and away from things--and watch."

"I was 'high up' when I wrote them," answered Andrew with a laugh. "Look
over there on the hill--see those two old locusts? They are fern palms
and those scrub oaks are palmettos. The white frost makes the meadow a
lagoon and this rock is the pier of my bridge where I came out to watch
one night to test the force of a freshet. Over there the light from Mrs.
Matilda's fires is the construction camp and beyond that hill is my
bungalow. That's the same old moon that's rising relentlessly to murder
the stars again. Do you want to stay and watch the tragedy--or hunt?"

Without a word Caroline sank down on the dried leaves that lay in a drift
on the edge of the bluff. Andrew crouched close beside her to the
windward. And the ruthless old moon that was putting the stars out of
business by the second was not in the least abashed to find them gazing
at her as she blustered up over the ridge, round and red with exertion.

"Were you alone on that pier?" asked Caroline with the utmost naïveté, as
she snuggled down deeper into the collar of the sweater.

"I'm generally alone--in most ways," answered Andrew, the suspicion of a
laugh covering the sadness in his tone. "I seem to see myself going
through life alone unless something happens--quick!" The bitter note