her round, creamy cheeks. The very minute she reached the top of the
steps an over-harbour boy asked her to dance and the next moment they
were in the pavilion that had been built seaward of the lighthouse for
dances. It was a delightful spot, roofed over with fir-boughs and hung
with lanterns. Beyond was the sea in a radiance that glowed and
shimmered, to the left the moonlit crests and hollows of the sand-dunes,
to the right the rocky shore with its inky shadows and its crystalline
coves. Rilla and her partner swung in among the dancers; she drew a long
breath of delight; what witching music Ned Burr of the Upper Glen was
coaxing from his fiddle--it was really like the magical pipes of the
old tale which compelled all who heard them to dance. How cool and fresh
the gulf breeze blew; how white and wonderful the moonlight was over
everything! This was life--enchanting life. Rilla felt as if her feet
and her soul both had wings.



CHAPTER IV

THE PIPER PIPES

Rilla's first party was a triumph--or so it seemed at first. She had so
many partners that she had to split her dances. Her silver slippers
seemed verily to dance of themselves and though they continued to pinch
her toes and blister her heels that did not interfere with her enjoyment
in the least. Ethel Reese gave her a bad ten minutes by beckoning her
mysteriously out of the pavilion and whispering, with a Reese-like
smirk, that her dress gaped behind and that there was a stain on the
flounce. Rilla rushed miserably to the room in the lighthouse which was
fitted up for a temporary ladies' dressing-room, and discovered that the