ught the
Far Hill people into focus, sharply and suddenly.

"He has miles of books," Jerry-Jo went on, "and a fiddle and pictures and
gewgaws. He plays devil tunes, and he's bewitched!"

This description made the vague boy of the woods real and vital for the
first time in Priscilla's life, and she shuddered. Then Jerry-Jo
generously offered to lend her one of the books until his father came
back, and Priscilla eagerly stepped from stone to stone until she could
reach the volume. Once she had obtained the prize she went back to the
garden and made herself comfortable, wholly forgetting Jerry-Jo and the
world at large.

It was the oddest book she had ever seen. The words were arranged in
charming little rows, and when you read them over and over they sang
themselves into your very heart. They told you, lilting along, of a road
that no one but you ever knew--a road that led in and out through wonders
of beauty and faded at the day's end into your heart's desire. Your
Heart's Desire!

And just then Jerry-Jo cried:

"Hey, there! you, Priscilla, come down with that book."

"Your Heart's Desire!" Priscilla's eyes were misty as she repeated the
words. Indeed, one large, full tear escaped the blue eyes and lay like a
pitiful kiss on the fair page, where there was a broad, generous space
for tears on either side of the lines.

"Hist! Father's coming!"

Then Priscilla stood up and a demon seemed to possess her.

"I'm not going to give it back to you! It's mine!" she cried shrilly.

Jerry-Jo made as if he were about to dash up the path and annihilate her,
but she stayed him by holding the book aloft and calling:

"If you do I'll throw it in the Channel!" She looked equal to it, too,
and Jerry-Jo swore one angry word and stopped short. Then the girl's mood
changed. Quite gently and noiselessly she ran to Jerry-Jo and held the
opened book toward him. His keen eye fell upon the tear-stain, but his
coarser nature wrongly interpreted it.

"You imp!" he cried; "you spat upon it!"

But Priscilla shook her head. "No--it's a tear," she explained; "and, oh!
Jerry-Jo, it is mine--listen!--you cannot take it away from me."

And standing there upon the rock she repeated the words of the poem, her
rich voice rising and falling musically, and poor Jerry-Jo, hypnotized by
that which he could not comprehend, listened open-mouthed.

* * * * *

And now, again, it was spring and Priscilla was fourteen.