an who, since New Year's, had adopted a new method of dealing
with Felicity--whether by way of keeping his resolution or because he
had discovered that it annoyed Felicity far more than angry retorts,
deponent sayeth not. He invariably met her criticisms with a
good-natured grin and a flippant remark with some tender epithet tagged
on to it. Poor Felicity used to get hopelessly furious over it.

Uncle Alec was dubious about our going that day. He looked abroad on
the general dourness of gray earth and gray air and gray sky, and said
a storm was brewing. But Cousin Mattie had been sent word that we
were coming, and she did not like to be disappointed, so he let us go,
warning us to stay with Cousin Mattie all night if the storm came on
while we were there.

We enjoyed our walk--even Felix enjoyed it, although he had been
appointed to write up the visit for Our Magazine and was rather weighed
down by the responsibility of it. What mattered it though the world were
gray and wintry? We walked the golden road and carried spring time in
our hearts, and we beguiled our way with laughter and jest, and the
tales the Story Girl told us--myths and legends of elder time.

The walking was good, for there had lately been a thaw and everything
was frozen. We went over fields, crossed by spidery trails of gray
fences, where the withered grasses stuck forlornly up through the
snow; we lingered for a time in a group of hill pines, great, majestic
tree-creatures, friends of evening stars; and finally struck into the
belt of fir and maple which intervened between Carlisle and Baywater.
It was in this locality that Peg Bowen lived, and our way lay near her
house though not directly in sight of it. We hoped we would not meet
her, for since the affair of the bewitchment of Paddy we did not know
quite what to think of Peg; the boldest of us held his breath as we
passed her haunts, and drew it again with a sigh of relief when they
were safely left behind.

The woods were full of the brooding stillness that often precedes a
storm, and the wind crept along their white, cone-sprinkled floors with
a low, wailing cry. Around us were solitudes of snow, arcades picked out
in pearl and silver, long avenues of untrodden marble whence sprang the
cathedral columns of the firs. We were all sorry when we were through
the woods and found ourselves looking down into the snug, commonplace,
farmstead-dotted settlement of Baywater.

"There's Cousin Mattie's