nce she turned her face so that it rested against his
shoulder--nestled closer, and lay very still.

[Illustration]

VI

ALL over the United States conditions were becoming terrible, hundreds
and hundreds of thousands of militant women, wives, widows, matrons,
maidens, and stenographers had gone on strike. Non-intercourse with man
was to be the punishment for any longer withholding the franchise;
husbands, fathers, uncles, fiances, bachelors, and authors held frantic
mass meetings to determine what course to pursue in the imminence of
rapidly impending industrial, political, and social disaster.

But, although men's sufferings threatened to be frightful; although for
months now nobody of the gentler sex had condescended to pay them the
slightest attention; although their wives replied to them only with
monosyllables and scornful smiles, and their sweethearts were never at
home to them, let it be remembered to their eternal credit that not one
thought of surrender ever entered their limited minds.

And so it was with young Langdon, who was left in a condition neither
dignified nor picturesque--a martyr to friendship and a victim to his own
rather frivolous idea of practical humour.

Hopelessly entangled in the net which enveloped him from head to foot, he
flopped about among the dead leaves on the bank of the stream, struggling
and kicking like a fly in a cobweb. This he considered humorous.

The lithe figure across the brook continued to view his gyrations with
mingled emotions.

She was a boyish young thing with a full-lipped, sensitive mouth, eyes
like bluish-black velvet, and clipped hair of a dull gold colour that
curled thickly all over a small and beautifully shaped head in little
burnished _boucles d'or_--which description ought to hold the reader for
a while.

She wore gray wool kilts, riding breeches laced in about the knee, suede
puttees and tan shoes; and she carried a Russian game pouch beautifully
embroidered across her right shoulder.

For a minute or two she watched the entangled young man, eyes still wide
with the excitement of the chase, full delicate lips softly parted; and
her intent and earnest face reflected modest triumph charmingly modified
by an involuntary sympathy--the natural tribute of a generous sportswoman
to the quarry successfully stalked and bagged.

Cautiously, now, but without hesitation she advanced to the edge of the
stream, picked her way cleverly across it on t