ted. Dave had seen Juliana, but Juliana had had until
this moment no sight of Dave, for though there was in Newbern no social
prejudice against a craftsman, and Dave might have moved in its highest
circles, he had chosen to consort with the frankly ineligible. He lifted
his cap in a flourishing salute as Juliana and Patricia came through the
stile.

"And how are you to-day, my young friend?" asked Juliana of Wilbur in
her calm, deep voice.

The Wilbur twin said, "Very well, I thank you," striving instinctively
to make his own voice as deep as Juliana's.

The girl winked at him brazenly as they passed on.

"Gypsies!" she called, exultantly, and Juliana swept him with a tolerant
smile.

Dave Cowan watched them along the path to the ridge above the camp. Here
they paused in most intelligible pantomime. Patricia Whipple wished to
descend to the very heart of the camp, while Juliana could be seen
informing the child that they were near enough. To make this definite
she sat upon the bole of a felled oak beside the path while Patricia
jiggled up and down in eloquent objection to the untimely halt. Dave
read the scene and caressed his thick moustache with practiced thumb and
finger. His glance was sympathetic.

"The poor old maid!" he murmured. "All that Whipple money, and she has
to be just a small-towner! Say, I bet no one has ever kissed that old
girl since her mother died! None of these small-town hicks would ever
have the nerve to. Yes, sir; any one's got a right to be sorry for that
dame. If she had a little enterprise she'd branch out from here and meet
a few people."

"Yes, sir," said Wilbur. "But that girl wants to go down to the camp."

This was plain. Patricia still danced, while Juliana remained firmly
seated.

"I could go take her down," he continued.

"Why don't you?" said his father, again stroking the golden moustache in
sympathy for the unconscious Juliana.

So it befell that the Wilbur twin shyly approached the group by the
felled tree, and the watching father saw the two children, after a
moment's hesitancy on the part of Juliana, disappear from view over the
crest of the ridge. Dave continued to loll by the stile and to watch the
waiting Juliana, thinking of gypsies and the pure joy of wandering. He
began to repeat some verses he had lately happened upon, murmuring them
to a little mass of white clouds far off against the blue of the summer
sky, where the pale bronze moon lonesomely hung. He li