neath her pretty chin.
Then, taking her long, dark lashes between thumb and finger, he
opened the lids.

"You are hurting," said she, soberly; and now the lashes were
trying to pull free.

"I can see it," said he.

"It must be a bear--you look so frightened."

"It's nothing to be afraid of," said the boy.

"Well, your hands tremble," said she, laughing.

"There," he answered, removing a speck of dust with his
handkerchief.

"It is gone now, thank you," said Polly, winking.

She stood close to him, and as she spoke her lips trembled. He
could delay no longer with a subject knocking at the gate of speech.

"Do you believe in love at first sight?" he asked.

She turned, looking up at him seriously. Her lips parted in a
smile that showed her white teeth. Then her glance fell. "I shall
not tell you that," said she, in a half whisper.

"I hope we shall meet again," he said,

"Do you?" said she, glancing up at him shyly.

"Yes."

"Well, if I were you and wanted to see a girl,--I'd--I'd come and
see her."

"What if you didn't know whether she was willing or not?" he asked.

"I'd take my chances," said she, soberly.

There were pauses in which their souls went far beyond their words
and seemed to embrace each other fondly with arms of the spirit
invisible and resistless. And whatever was to come, in that hour
the great priest of Love in the white robe of innocence had made
them one. The air about them was full of strange delight, They
were in deep dusk as they neared the house. For one moment of
long-remembered joy she let him put his arm about her waist, but
when he kissed her cheek she drew herself away.

They walked a little time in silence.

"I am no flirt," she whispered presently. Neither spoke for a
moment.

Then she seemed to feel and pity his emotion. Something slowed the
feet of both.

"There," she whispered; "you may kiss my hand if you care to."

He kissed the pretty hand that was offered to him, and her whisper
seemed to ring in the dusky silence like the dying rhythm of a bell.

IX

Drove and Drovers

A little after daybreak they went on with the cows. For half a
mile or more until the little house had sunk below the hill crest
Trove was looking backward. Now and ever after he was to think and
tarry also in the road of life and look behind him for the golden
towers of memory. The drovers saw a change in Trove and flung at
him with their stock of rusty, ancestra