saw her at a distance
along the shore but she always disappeared as soon as seen.
Occasionally as he crossed the point he saw her working in her garden
but he never went very near the house, feeling that he had no right to
spy on it or her in any way. He soon became convinced that she avoided
him purposely and the conviction piqued him. He felt an odd masterful
desire to meet her face to face and make her look at him. Sometimes he
called himself a fool and vowed he would go no more to the Four Winds
shore. Yet he inevitably went. He did not find in the shore the
comfort and inspiration he had formerly found. Something had come
between his soul and the soul of the wilderness--something he did not
recognize or formulate--a nameless, haunting longing that shaped
itself about the memory of a cold sweet face and starry, indifferent
eyes, grey as the lake at dawn.

Of Captain Anthony he never got even a glimpse, but he saw the old
cousin several times, going and coming about the yard and its
environs. Finally one day he met her, coming up a path which led to a
spring down in a firry hollow. She was carrying two heavy pails of
water and Alan asked permission to help her.

He half expected a repulse, for the tall, grim old woman had a rather
stern and forbidding look, but after gazing at him a moment in a
somewhat scrutinizing manner she said briefly, "You may, if you like."

Alan took the pails and followed her, the path not being wide enough
for two. She strode on before him at a rapid, vigorous pace until they
came out into the yard by the house. Alan felt his heart beating
foolishly. Would he see Lynde Oliver? Would--

"You may carry the water there," the old woman said, pointing to a
little outhouse near the pines. "I'm washing--the spring water is
softer than the well water. Thank you"--as Alan set the pails down on
a bench--"I'm not so young as I was and bringing the water so far
tires me. Lynde always brings it for me when she's home."

She stood before him in the narrow doorway, blocking his exit, and
looked at him with keen, deep-set dark eyes. In spite of her withered
aspect and wrinkled face, she was not an uncomely old woman and there
was about her a dignity of carriage and manner that pleased Alan. It
did not occur to him to wonder why it should please him. If he had
hunted that feeling down he might have been surprised to discover that
it had its origin in a curious gratification over the thought that the