ago.
Do you not remember the story of Jacob Steiner, and how he spent days
and days in the woods, selecting the trees for his violins, and how
the spirits of the trees revenged themselves by telling him of their
ruined lives till he went mad?"

"But there was no madness in this music," Adam answered, "except,
except--"

"The supreme, sublime madness of love? Do you not know, surely you do,
that every perfect violin is as much man and woman as you and I? The
back of the violin is made from the timber of the female tree, the
belly of the male tree. The harmony depends on their vibrations, as
they clasp each other in an embrace as real--"

"As this," he cried, drawing her closer, and bending his handsome head
until their lips met. "Sweet, must I envy that violin?"

He felt her heart beating wildly against his own, their arms closed
around each other convulsively. The sweetness of the music-laden,
flower-scented air filled his senses.

"God! how I love you!" he said.

A frightened look came into her eyes, and she struggled, for a moment,
futilely.

"Let me go!" she whispered; "let me go!"

"Do you want me to?" he answered, studying her face in the moonlight.

"No," she said. "No, never again, but, oh, Adam!"

XXII

I'm weary of conjectures--this must end them.

ADDISON.

Adam had to go to the cane-fields across the range, and one of the
calves needed Robin's ministrations, so she could not go with him. He
started before the stars were set, that he might be back before night,
and returned twice to kiss her before he finally got away.

Left with the long day ahead of her, restless and lonely, she gave the
small house a thorough sweeping and cleaning. She had finished her
dusting, and was rearranging the furniture, when she shoved back the
long chest and struck the framework of the window with some little
violence. It was enough to jar a rusty key from its place above the
casement, and it dropped upon the chest with a kind of ominous clink
as it struck the lock, and fell upon the floor. She took it up and
looked at it curiously, and then, kneeling, fitted it in the lock.

"I wonder," she mused, "what I shall set free if I open this box; is
it Pandora's? But there was nothing left in hers but hope, and that is
all we need. How happy we could be if we dared to hope!"

She turned the key with a wrench, and the hasp shot from its place.
The chest was nearly empty, there being but one parcel in