for this I thought might lay undue
stress upon the matter. And in the course of the morning, nothing
further having been said, I was lulled into a sense of security.

In the afternoon Bishop Berkeley's book called me again and it was not
until late that I realized that the boy had been gone from the house
for four hours. His rod, creel and fly-book were missing from their
accustomed places but even then I suspected nothing. It was not until
the approach of the dinner hour when, Jerry not having returned, I
began to think of yesterday's visitor.

After waiting dinner for awhile, I dined alone, expecting every minute
to hear the sound of his step in the hall or his cheery greeting but
there was no sign of him and I guessed the truth. The minx had come in
again and Jerry was with her.

The events which followed were the first that cast the slightest
shadow over our friendship, a shadow which was not to pass, for, from
the day when Eve entered our garden, Jerry was changed. It wasn't that
he loved me any the less or I him. It was merely that his attitude
toward life and toward my point of view had shifted. He had begun to
doubt my infallibility.

It was this indefinable difference in our relations which delayed
Jerry's confession, and not until some days later did he tell me how
it all happened. He didn't think she would really come back, he said,
and I chose at the time not to doubt him, but the fact was that he
made his way directly upstream after leaving the house, and catching
no fish, sat down on a rock near the iron grille. That the girl
returned was not Jerry's fault, he said, because he didn't ask her to.
But the fact that he was there awaiting her when she arrived shows
that the wish was the father to the thought with Jerry. He had been
sitting there alone fifteen or twenty minutes "listening for bird
calls," as he explained it and had already identified twenty distinct
notes when he heard the twenty-first.

It was human. "Hello, Jerry," it said.

It came from the iron railing, behind which the female Una was
standing, grinning at him. He got up and walked toward her.

"Hello!" he returned.

"You didn't think I'd come, did you, Jerry?" she asked, though how she
could have arrived at that conclusion with the boy sitting there
waiting for her is more than I can imagine.

"No, I didn't," he replied, already learning to prevaricate with calm
assurance. "Are you coming in?"

"I will if you ask me to."

"I