The little wheel, shaped from a block of firwood, was turning
merrily under a jet of water carefully conducted to it from a
neighbouring fall. David went down on hands and knees to examine
it. He made some little alteration in the primitive machinery of
it, his fingers touching it lightly and neatly, and then, delighted
with the success of it, he called Louie to come and look.

Louie was sitting a few yards further up the stream, crooning to
herself as she swung to and fro, and snatching every now and then
at some tufts of primroses growing near her, which she wrenched
away with a hasty, wasteful hand, careless, apparently, whether
they reached her lap or merely strewed the turf about her with
their torn blossoms. When David called her she gathered up the
flowers anyhow in her apron, and dawdled towards him, leaving a
trail of them behind her. As she reached him, however, she was
struck by a book sticking out of his pocket, and, stooping over
him, with a sudden hawk-like gesture, as he sprawled head
downwards, she tried to get hold of it.

But he felt her movement. 'Let goo!' he said imperiously, and,
throwing himself round, while one foot slipped into the water, he
caught her hand, with its thin predatory fingers, and pulled the
book away.

'Yo just leave my books alone, Louie. Yo do 'em a mischeef whaniver
yo can--an I'll not have it.'

He turned his handsome, regular face, crimsoned by his position and
splashed by the water, towards her with an indignant air. She