spiration dried on her
face. There were curious whining, humming sounds in the woods. She began
to scratch her ankles and wrists. Her ankles especially tickled and
itched to the point of anguish. She was the delightful centre of
interest to a swarm of hungry mosquitoes. She leaped to her feet and
fought them wildly with her branch of poison-ivy. Then she started to
run and almost stepped on a man who was lying face up in the underwood,
peacefully snoring. She screamed faintly and hurried on. Some of the
bolder mosquitoes followed her into the sunlight, but it was too hot
even for them, and one by one they dropped behind and returned to the
woods. The drunken man continued his comfortable sleep. The mosquitoes
did not trouble him. It is unknown why.

Lila returned to the end of the dock and saw far off a white speck that
may or may not have been the motor-boat in which Fannie had gone for a
"sail."

If there hadn't been so many people about Lila must have sat down and
cried. The warmth of affection which she had felt that morning for
Fannie had changed into hatred. Three times she returned to the end of
the dock.

All over the park were groups of people eating sandwiches and
hard-boiled eggs. They shouted and joked. Under certain circumstances,
not the least of sports is eating. Lila was so angry and hungry and
abused that she forgot her sore feet. She couldn't stay still. She must
have walked--coming and going--a good many miles in all.

At last, exhausted as she had never been even after a day at the
department store during the Christmas rush, she found a deep niche
between two rough rocks on the beach, over which the tide was now gently
rising, and sank into it. The rocks and the sand between them gave out
coolness; the sun shone on her head and shoulders, but with less than
its meridianal fury. She could look down Pelham Bay and see most of the
waters between Fort Schuyler and City Island. Boats of all sorts and
descriptions came and went. But there was no sign of that in which
Fannie had embarked.

Lila fell asleep. It became quiet in the park. The people were dragging
themselves wearily home, dishevelled, dirty, sour with sweat. The sun
went down, copper-red and sullen. The trunks of trees showed ebony black
against it, swarms of infinitesimal gnats rose from the beaches, and
made life hideous to the stragglers still in the park.

Lila was awakened by the tide wetting her feet. She rose on stiff,
aching leg