uted to his inspired mood, but
Love was the first violin in that orchestra under Nature's
conductorship--Nature, whose hour it was, walking, a god, in the Garden
of Eden in the cool of the day.

And here came Deb, gliding towards him by a path that he could not see,
holding her lace skirts tightly bunched in her nervous hands. Youth to
youth, beauty to beauty, man to woman, woman to man, the magnet to the
steel--they were just elements of the elements, for once in their lives.

"How fortunate that I put on black tonight," thought Deb, as she
pursued her stealthy way at the back of bushes--"and something that
does not rustle!"

"How beautiful she was tonight!" thought Claud. "How a dark dress
throws up that superb neck of hers! I'll take her to Europe, and show
her to the sculptors and painters; but where's the hand that could
carve that shape, or the paint that could give her colour? I'll have a
London season with her, and see her snuff out the milk-and-water
debutantes. No milk-and-water about Deb--wine and fire!--and withal so
proud and unapproachable. That hulking brute imagines--but he'll find
his mistake if he attempts to cross the line. Beauty, passion,
purity--what a blend! She's a woman alone--the blue rose of women--and
she is mine." He murmured, to some cadence of a Schubert serenade: "My
Deb! My love! My love! My queen!" and suddenly stopped short in his
musings.

Her foot crunched the gravel behind him. Without turning his head, he
sat alertly motionless for several minutes, listening, holding his
breath. Then he dropped his cigar gently.

"Fine night, Deb," he remarked aloud.

There was no immediate answer, but presently a low chuckle from the
laurel bushes.

"How did you know it was me?" she asked, imitating his casual tone.

"Couldn't explain, I'm sure. It was borne in on me, somehow."

"You did not see me."

"I don't want to see, in your case. I feel you."

There was another brief silence, and then she rustled off a step or two.

"Well, good-night! I just came out to look for a book I left here
somewhere."

"What book?" "It doesn't matter. It is too late to read tonight,
anyhow."

"It spoils books to leave them out all night. I will help you to find
it." He got up, and pretended to look about. "It is not on this seat--"

"Perhaps Miss Keene has taken it in. She is always after me to pick up
my litters. It won't rain, anyway, so it doesn't matter."

"No, it won't rain tonight. Awfully