e things killed--"

Half-way up, we passed the man. His hat came off when he saw me. "It's
cold weather we're having," he said pleasantly.

"It's getting warmer," I flung back at him, and William drove on with a
grunt.

I had Junior with me, and when I reached the house I went straight
up-stairs. In the very center of the room in the hooded mahogany cradle
was another crumpled rose-leaf of a child. But this was not a "Junior."

"Robin-son," Lady Crusoe had whispered, when I had first bent over her
and had asked the baby's name.

"Because of the robins?" I had asked.

She shook her head. "I couldn't call him Crusoe, could I?"

So there he lay, little Robinson Crusoe, in a desert expanse of polished
floor, and there he crowed a welcome to my own beautiful baby!

Lady Crusoe was in a big chair. She was not strong, and William Watters
had brought his sister Mandy to wait on her. She was very pale, this
lovely lady, and there were shadows under her eyes. As I sat down beside
her, she said: "I shall have to have your Billy sell some more things
for me. You see the servants must be paid, and my Robin must be comfy.
There's a console-table that ought to bring a lot from a city dealer."

"I wish that you needn't be worried," I said. "I wish--I wish--that
you'd let me send for Robin's father--"

"Robin's father!" she drew a quick breath, "how funny it
sounds!--_Robin's father_--"

I waited for that to sink in, and then I said: "I know how you feel.
When I think of Billy as Junior's father it is different from thinking
of him as my husband, and it makes a funny sensation in my throat as if
I wanted to cry--"

"You've nothing to cry about," she told me fiercely, "nothing, but I
sometimes feel as if I could weep rivers of tears!"

I realized that I must be careful, so I changed the subject. "William,"
I said after a pause, "is worrying about a man who is hunting over the
grounds."

"He told me. I can't understand why any one should trespass when the
place is posted. I sent William to tell him, but it didn't seem to have
any effect. I haven't heard him shoot. When I do, I shall go out and
speak to him myself."

I wondered if Fate were going to settle it in that way, and I wondered
too if it would be breaking my promise to tell him to shoot! We sewed in
silence for a while, but Lady Crusoe was restless. At last she wandered
to the window. It was a long French window which opened on a balcony.
She parted the velvet c