irst time in his whole life, Martin understood
the meaning of the word happiness. It gripped and shook him and made his
heart ache with a delicious pain.

"It's hard to believe," he murmured, "such a very small girl went away
and such a very grown up little woman has come back. Let's see--twenty
is it? My, you make me feel old--but you say I haven't changed much."

"You haven't. A little bit of gray, a number of tiny wrinkles about your
eyes"--the tips of two dainty fingers touched them lightly--"and you're
a bit thinner--that's all. Why you look so good to me, Uncle Martin, I
could fall in love with you myself, if you weren't auntie's husband."

It was an innocent remark, and he understood it as such, but its effect
on him was dynamic.

"You always were as pretty as a picture," he said slowly, his nerves
tingling, "if a farmer's opinion is worth anything in that line."

This was twaddle, of course, and Martin knew it. Rather it was the
city person's point of view he was inclined to belittle. He had the
confidence in his superiority that comes from complete economic security
and his pride of place was even more deeply rooted. Men of Martin's
class who are able to gaze, in at least one direction, as far as eye can
see over their own land, are shrewd, sharp, intelligent, and far better
informed on current events and phases of thought than the people of
commercial centers even imagine. There is nothing of the peasant about
them. Martin knew quite well that dressed in his best clothes and put
among a crowd of strange business men he would be taken for one of their
own--so easy was his bearing, so naturally correct his speech.

Something of all this had already registered in Rose's mind. "Come on,
Uncle Martin," she laughed, "flatter me. I just love it!"

"Very well, then, I'll say that you've come back as pretty a little
woman as ever I've laid eyes on."

"Is that all? Oh, Uncle Martin, just pretty? The boys usually say I'm
beautiful."

"You are beautiful--as beautiful as a rose. That's what you are, a red,
red rose of Sharon--with your dove's eyes, your little white teeth
like a flock of even sheep and your sweet, pretty lips like a thread of
scarlet."

"Why, Uncle Martin!" exclaimed the girl, a trifle puzzled by the
intensity of his quiet tone, and stressing their relationship ever so
lightly. "You're almost a poet."

"You mean old King Solomon was," he retrieved himself quickly. "Don't
you ever read the Bibl