n agreeable impression on this handsome boy who
seemed so fond of Lloyd. She wanted to be first in his attentions, and,
as usual, she had her way.

"I told you so!" she cried, presently, as a large capital L appeared
under Malcolm's initials. "I knew you just couldn't help making an L,
and the next one will be an S."

"I'm not done yet," he said, with a smiling side-glance at her, and
added two more lines, changing the L to an E. An expression of pleasure
flashed across her face, as he outlined an F next to it. It would be
something to tell Mollie and Fay and Kell next time she wrote, that the
handsomest boy in Kentucky (as she enthusiastically described him to
them), with the manners of a Sir Philip Sidney, had left the record of
his attachment for her where all might read.

She gave him another smile from under her long black eyelashes, and then
looked down with a blush. He added the heart to the inscription then,
and pierced it with an arrow.

While these two played at a game that older children had played before
them for many a generation (as the scarred old tree-trunks bore silent
witness on every hand), the game of "I spy" went on uproariously behind
the columbine rock. The bonfire blazed higher and higher. It lighted the
cool depths of the darkening woods, and sent dancing shadows across the
deep ravines, and presently the picnic feast was spread near by and part
of the supper was cooked over its coals.

It was by its weird light that the charades were played, when the feast
had been cleared away. Miss Allison arranged them. The actors were all
little negroes, the funniest, blackest little pickaninnies that ever
sung a song or danced a double shuffle.

"It's Sylvia Gibbs's family," explained Miss Allison, to the girls. "Our
circle of King's Daughters had them under its wing all winter, or they
would have starved. When I discovered what heathen they were, I turned
missionary and taught them an hour every Sunday afternoon. They will do
anything for me now, and are such clever little mimics that I know they
can act the charades charmingly. Besides, they will give us a cake-walk
afterward, and sing for us like nightingales."

While Miss Allison marshalled her flock of little darkies behind the
great rock, Mrs. Sherman called the children to seat themselves in a
semicircle on the camp-stools and rugs in front. "This is to be a
guessing contest," she explained, as she passed a card and pencil to
each guest. "Th