nd out--"

"Found out! What perfectly revolting vanity! Do you suppose that the
moment I left you I rushed home and began to make happy and incoherent
inquiries? Mr. Hamil, you disappoint me every time you speak--and also
every time you don't."

"I seem to be doomed."

"You are. You can't help it. Tell me--as inoffensively as possible--are
you here to begin your work?"

"M-my work?"

"Yes, on the Cardross estate--"

"You have heard of that!" he exclaimed, surprised.

"Y-es--" negligently. "Petty gossip circulates here. A cracker at West
Palm Beach built a new chicken coop, and we all heard of it. Tell me, do
you still desire to see me again?"

"I do--to pay a revengeful debt or two."

"Oh! I have offended you? Pay me now, if you please, and let us end this
indiscretion."

"You will let me see you again, won't you?"

"Why? Mr. Hamil."

"Because I--I _must_!"

"Oh! You are becoming emphatic. So I am going.... And I've half a mind
to take you back and present you to my family.... Only it wouldn't do
for _me_; any other girl perhaps might dare--under the circumstances;
but _I_ can't--and that's all I'll tell you."

Hamil, standing straight and tall, straw hat tucked under one arm, bent
toward her with the formality and engaging deference natural to him.

"You have been very merciful to me; only a girl of your caste could
afford to. Will you forgive my speaking to you as I did?--when I said
'Calypso!' I have no excuse; I don't know why I did. I'm even sorrier
for myself than for you."

"I _was_ hurt.... Then I supposed that you did not mean it.
Besides"--she looked up with her rare smile--"I knew you, Mr. Hamil, in
the boat this morning. I haven't really been very dreadful."

"You knew even _then_?"

"Yes, I did. The Palm Beach News published your picture a week ago; and
I read all about the very remarkable landscape architect who was coming
to turn the Cardross jungle into a most wonderful Paradise."

"You knew me all that time?"

"All of it, Mr. Hamil."

"From the moment you climbed into my boat?"

"Practically. Of course I did not look at you very closely at first....
Does that annoy you? It seems to ... or something does, for even in the
dusk I can see your ever-ready blush--"

"I don't know why you pretend to think me such a fool," he protested,
laughing; "you seemed to take that for granted from the very first."

"Why not? You persistently talked to me when you didn't know me--you're
do