roofs beyond.

All around him now, as the air grew sweet with the breath of orange
blossoms, a subtler scent, delicately persistent, came to him on the
sea-wind; and he remembered it!--the lilac perfume of China-berry in
bloom; Calypso's own immortal fragrance. And, in the brilliant sunshine,
there under green trees with the dome of blue above, unbidden, the
shadows of the past rose up; and once more lantern-lit faces crowded
through the aromatic dark; once more the fountains' haze drifted across
dim lawns; once more he caught the faint, uncertain rustle of her gown
close to him as she passed like a fresh breath through the dusk.

Overhead a little breeze became entangled in the palmetto fronds,
setting them softly clashing together as though a million unseen elfin
hands were welcoming his return; the big black-and-gold butterflies,
beating up against the sudden air current, flapped back to their honeyed
haven in the orange grove; bold, yellow-eyed grackle stared at him from
the grass; a bird like a winged streak of flame flashed through the
jungle and was gone.

And now every breath he drew was quickening his pulses with the sense of
home-coming; he saw the red-bellied woodpeckers sticking like shreds of
checked gingham to the trees, turning their pointed heads incuriously as
he passed; the welling notes of a wren bubbled upward through the
sun-shot azure; high in the vault above an eagle was passing seaward,
silver of tail and crest, winged with bronze; and everywhere on every
side glittered the gold-and-saffron dragon-flies of the South like the
play of sunbeams on a green lagoon.

Under the sapodilla-trees on the lawn two aged, white-clad negro
servants were gathering fruit forbidden them; and at sight of him two
wrinkled black hands furtively wiped two furrowed faces free from
incriminating evidence; two solemn pairs of eyes rolled piously in his
direction.

"Mohnin', suh, Mistuh Hamil."

"Good morning, Jonas; good morning, Archimedes. Mr. Cardross is in the
orange grove, I see."

And, smiling, passed the guilty ones with a humorously threatening shake
of his head.

A black boy, grinning, opened the gate; the quick-stepping figure in
white flannels glanced around at the click of the latch.

"Hamil! Good work! I am glad to see you!"--his firm, sun-burnt hands
closing over Hamil's--"glad all through!"

"Not as glad as I am, Mr. Cardross--"

"Yes, I am. Why didn't you come before? The weather has been he