radiance, till they
reached their doorway. Then there were a thousand things to do. First
Nannette was made comfortable in the stable; then the chickens were
summoned to a meal of yellow corn, and when Lassie drove the cows into
the barnyard, each was congratulated in turn upon her calf, and those
interesting, if wobbly, bovine infants were carefully inspected. After
supper they sat down before the fire, very tired, but the nearest
happy they had been in a year. The dogs were lying about them, and the
thump, thump of first one tail and then another told the story of
canine content, while the kittens walked over them impartially.

"What a strange thing human nature is!" Adam said. "The only thing
needed to make our life perfect is that it shall not last. The moment,
if that moment ever comes, when it is real no more, it will become
ideal."

"I know," she said dreamily. "Things in the world used to be too good
to be true. This must cease to be, to be good at all."

XI

Yet if Hope has flown away
In a night, or in a day,
In a vision, or in none.
Is it therefore the less gone?
All that we see or seem
Is but a dream within a dream.

POE.

"It is the first of May," said Adam. "It is a year ago to-day. Shall
we pass the gateway?"

"Not now," answered Robin. "Wait till afternoon. I am so busy this
morning."

She was sitting at the table teaching half a dozen little chickens to
appreciate hard-boiled egg. The wounded kid was lying in her lap, one
arm was about it, and an adventurous kitten looked over her shoulder.
As she tapped on the board with one slender forefinger, the chickens,
hearing their mother's bill, began picking up the fragments of egg.
She had rounded out wonderfully in a year, and Adam realized for the
first time that she was a very beautiful woman.

"Suppose," she went on, "you begin your book to-day. Write your
description of a year ago. It will never be so plain again. There is
plenty of time before we go. Besides, if it is a dream, we shall want
the written record to show what dreams may come."

Adam hesitated a moment, then went to his desk. She had said truly,
the events of that day would never again be so clear, and as he began
to record them they marshaled themselves before him, until he found
himself writing with a dramatic power that fascinated and amazed him.

It must have been some time afterward that Robin stole in and set a
glass of milk, some