brightness. Then he smiled and his easy good nature returned.

"I'll get her to dance for me, never fear! I'll teach her to love music,
and I'll tell her stories. I must get her to explain about the lure of
the States. What on earth could the little beggar have meant? It sounded
as if she thought America had some sinister clutch on the Dominion. And
those infernal-sounding words!"

Travers shook with laughter. "That '_dosh_' was about the most
blasphemous thing I ever listened to. In a short space of time that child
managed to cram in more new ideas, words, and acts than any one I've ever
met before. I shouldn't wonder if she proves a character."




CHAPTER III


The day of warmth and song and dance changed to a cool evening. There was
a glowing sunset which faded into a clear, starry night.

Dick Travers, encased in a heavy sweater, lingered, after the light
failed, on the broad piazza facing the still purpled sky, and looked out
toward the Georgian Bay, which was hidden from sight by the ridge of hill
through which the Fox and Secret Portages cut. The mood of the afternoon
had fallen, as had the day, into calmness and restfulness. The fiddle,
which was never far from Travers, lay now beside him on the deep porch
swing, and every few moments he took it up and began an air that broke
off almost at once, either to run into another, or into silence.