ooks, a long tickle with a nice touch of
stroking now and then when one was not expecting it.

That night after dinner, when Alan had gone out and Flora into a dream,
she snuggled up alongside her father, got hold of his little finger, and
whispered:

"Come into the garden, Dad; I'll put on goloshes. It's an awfully nice
moon."

The moon indeed was palest gold behind the pines, so that its radiance
was a mere shower of pollen, just a brushing of white moth-down over
the reeds of their little dark pond, and the black blur of the flowering
currant bushes. And the young lime-trees, not yet in full leaf, quivered
ecstatically in that moon-witchery, still letting fall raindrops of
the past spring torrent, with soft hissing sounds. A real sense in
the garden, of God holding his breath in the presence of his own youth
swelling, growing, trembling toward perfection! Somewhere a bird--a
thrush, they thought--mixed in its little mind as to night and day, was
queerly chirruping. And Felix and his daughter went along the dark wet
paths, holding each other's arms, not talking much. For, in him, very
responsive to the moods of Nature, there was a flattered feeling, with
that young arm in his, of Spring having chosen to confide in him this
whispering, rustling hour. And in Nedda was so much of that night's
unutterable youth--no wonder she was silent! Then, somehow--neither
responsible--they stood motionless. How quiet it was, but for a distant
dog or two, and the stilly shivering-down of the water drops, and the
far vibration of the million-voiced city! How quiet and soft and fresh!
Then Nedda spoke:

"Dad, I do so want to know everything."

Not rousing even a smile, with its sublime immodesty, that aspiration
seemed to Felix infinitely touching. What less could youth want in the
very heart of Spring? And, watching her face put up to the night, her
parted lips, and the moon-gleam fingering her white throat, he answered:

"It'll all come soon enough, my pretty!"

To think that she must come to an end like the rest, having found out
almost nothing, having discovered just herself, and the particle of God
that was within her! But he could not, of course, say this.

"I want to FEEL. Can't I begin?"

How many millions of young creatures all the world over were sending
up that white prayer to climb and twine toward the stars, and--fall to
earth again! And nothing to be answered, but:

"Time enough, Nedda!"

"But, Dad, there are