t not
stop here and be spooney. Such a halcyon day I may not have again in all
my life, and I ought to make the best of it, with my New Skates."

So he dashed off, and filled the little cove above the Point with a
labyrinth of curves and flourishes.

When that bit of crystal tablet was well covered, the podographer sighed
for a new sheet to inscribe his intricate rubricas upon. Why not write
more stanzas of the poetry of motion on the ice below the Point? Why
not?

Braced by his lunch on the brown fibre of good Mrs. Purtett's cold
drumstick and thigh, Wade was now in fine trim. The air was more
glittering and electric than ever. It was triumph and victory and paean
in action to go flashing along over this footing, smoother than polished
marble and sheenier than first-water gems.

Wade felt the high exhilaration of pure blood galloping through a body
alive from top to toe. The rhythm of his movement was like music to him.

The Point ended in a sharp promontory. Just before he came abreast of
it, Wade under mighty headway flung into his favorite corkscrew spiral
on one foot, and went whirling dizzily along, round and round, in a
straight line.

At the dizziest moment, he was suddenly aware of a figure, also turning
the Point at full speed, and rushing to a collision.

He jerked aside to avoid it. He could not look to his footing. His skate
struck a broken oar, imbedded in the ice. He fell violently, and lay
like a dead man.

His New Skates, Testimonial of Merit, seem to have served him a shabby
trick.

CHAPTER VIII.

TETE-A-TETE.

Seeing Wade lie there motionless, the lady----

Took off her spectacles, blew her great red nose, and stiffly drew near.

Spectacles! Nose! No,--the latter feature of hers had never become
acquainted with the former; and there was as little stiffness as nasal
redness about her.

A fresh start, then,--and this time accuracy!

Appalled by the loud thump of the stranger's skull upon the chief river
of the State of New York, the lady--it was a young lady whom Wade had
tumbled to avoid--turned, saw a human being lying motionless, and swept
gracefully toward him, like a Good Samaritan, on the outer edge. It was
not her fault, but her destiny, that she had to be graceful even under
these tragic circumstances.

"Dead!" she thought. "Is he dead?"

The appalling thump had cracked the ice, and she could not know how well
the skull was cushioned inside with brains to resist a blow