extremely sombre and depressing, and it might
well have seemed a fit place to hide some guilty or
disgraceful secret. But on the bright morning
when Warwick stood looking through the cedars,
it seemed, with its green frame and canopy and its
bright carpet of flowers, an ideal retreat from the
fierce sunshine and the sultry heat of the approaching
summer.

The girl stooped to pluck a rose, and as she
bent over it, her profile was clearly outlined. She
held the flower to her face with a long-drawn
inhalation, then went up the steps, crossed the piazza,
opened the door without knocking, and entered
the house with the air of one thoroughly at home.

"Yes," said the young man to himself, "it's
Rena, sure enough."

The house stood on a corner, around which the
cedar hedge turned, continuing along the side of
the garden until it reached the line of the front of
the house. The piazza to a rear wing, at right
angles to the front of the house, was open to inspection
from the side street, which, to judge from its
deserted look, seemed to be but little used. Turning
into this street and walking leisurely past the
back yard, which was only slightly screened from
the street by a china-tree, Warwick perceived the
young woman standing on the piazza, facing an