s hook and began to put it on.

In two minutes they passed out of the front door, crossed the lawn, and
entered the wood by the north gate.

"Now, then, what did mamma say?" eagerly demanded Odalite, as they went
along the wooded path leading to the creek.

"She says, my darling, that I may write to you all the time I am away, as
I would write to my sister, if I had one; but that I must not draw you
into any engagement to marry--or words to that effect," replied Le,
putting the hard case as gently as he could.

"I thought she would do that," said Odalite, in a sorrowful and subdued
tone.

"But, dearest dear! that does not prevent my binding myself to you in the
most solemn manner for life and until death, and after death and to all
eternity, if one may be permitted to do so. And here I swear, under this
blue sky and bright moon and in the presence of high heaven, that I will
be true to you, Odalite, dearest Odalite, all the days of my life in this
world and in the next, forever and ever! But yet I must not bind you by
any promise, darling?"

"You do not need to, Le," she answered, sweetly and solemnly. "You do not
need to bind me by a promise. You know my heart, Le. And you know that you
can trust me! No word that might not pass between a brother and a sister
will pass between us, for we shall know each other's hearts, and that
shall suffice and satisfy us until we meet again, shall it not?"

"Yes, Odalite! Yes, dearest dear! Until we meet again! And when we meet
again, after my long voyage, by all that is holy and sacred in love and in
life neither man nor devil shall part us!" warmly exclaimed Leonidas.

"Oh, you mean things!" exclaimed a merry voice behind them.

Leonidas and Odalite turned at once to see two little figures in buttoned
coats and poke bonnets running toward them, followed by the dog.

"Oh, you mean things, you!" continued Wynnette, "to sneak for a walk to
Greenbushes, without telling me and Elva a word about it!"

"But Joshua told us--he did, indeed! You forgot to untie him when you
started, Odalite, and he set up such a howl of anguish and despair that I
had to run out to see what was the matter with him," said Elva.

"And I had to follow, and I found him telling Elf such a tragic tale of
how you and Le had gone off and left him tied up, without even looking
behind to bid him good-by, that his heart was quite broken, and he had
been trying to hang himself on his own chain ever since!" add