wn iris, he found, was curiously slashed with yellow, the color
of sunflower honey, or of old amber. In each eye one of these
streaks must have been larger than the others, for the effect was
that of two dancing points of light, two little yellow bubbles,
such as rise in a glass of champagne. Sometimes they seemed like
the sparks from a forge. She seemed so easily excited, to kindle
with a fierce little flame if one but breathed upon her. "What
a waste," Carl reflected. "She ought to be doing all that for a
sweetheart. How awkwardly things come about!"

It was not very long before Marie sprang up out of the grass again.
"Wait a moment. I want to show you something." She ran away and
disappeared behind the low-growing apple trees.

"What a charming creature," Carl murmured. "I don't wonder that
her husband is jealous. But can't she walk? does she always run?"

Alexandra nodded. "Always. I don't see many people, but I don't
believe there are many like her, anywhere."

Marie came back with a branch she had broken from an apricot tree,
laden with pale yellow, pink-cheeked fruit. She dropped it beside
Carl. "Did you plant those, too? They are such beautiful little
trees."

Carl fingered the blue-green leaves, porous like blotting-paper and
shaped like birch leaves, hung on waxen red stems. "Yes, I think
I did. Are these the circus trees, Alexandra?"

"Shall I tell her about them?" Alexandra asked. "Sit down like
a good girl, Marie, and don't ruin my poor hat, and I'll tell you
a story. A long time ago, when Carl and I were, say, sixteen and
twelve, a circus came to Hanover and we went to town in our wagon,
with Lou and Oscar, to see the parade. We hadn't money enough to
go to the circus. We followed the parade out to the circus grounds
and hung around until the show began and the crowd went inside the
tent. Then Lou was afraid we looked foolish standing outside in
the pasture, so we went back to Hanover feeling very sad. There
was a man in the streets selling apricots, and we had never seen
any before. He had driven down from somewhere up in the French
country, and he was selling them twenty-five cents a peck. We had
a little money our fathers had given us for candy, and I bought
two pecks and Carl bought one. They cheered us a good deal, and
we saved all the seeds and planted them. Up to the time Carl went
away, they hadn't borne at all."

"And now he's come back to eat them," cried Marie, nodding at Carl.
"That I