I wonder
what's the matter," thought Winfield. "'T isn't a letter, for to-day's
mail hasn't come and she was all right last night. Perhaps she isn't
ill--she said she cried when she was angry. Great Heavens! I hope she
isn't angry at me!

"She was awfully sweet to me just before I left her," he continued,
mentally, "so I'm not to blame. I wonder if she's angry at herself
because she offered to read the papers to me?"

All unknowingly he had arrived at the cause of Miss Thorne's
unhappiness. During a wakeful, miserable night, she had wished a
thousand times that she might take back those few impulsive words.

"That must be it," he thought, and then his face grew tender. "Bless her
sweet heart," he muttered, apropos of nothing, "I'm not going to make
her unhappy. It's only her generous impulse, and I won't let her think
it's any more."

The little maiden of his dreams was but a faint image just then, as he
sat down to plan a course of action which would assuage Miss Thorne's
tears. A grey squirrel appeared on the gate post, and sat there, calmly,
cracking a nut.

He watched the little creature, absently, and then strolled toward the
gate. The squirrel seemed tame and did not move until he was almost near
enough to touch it, and then it scampered only a little way.

"I'll catch it," Winfield said to himself, "and take it up to Miss
Thorne. Perhaps she'll be pleased."

It was simple enough, apparently, for the desired gift was always close
at hand. He followed it across the hill, and bent a score of times
to pick it up, but it was a guileful squirrel and escaped with great
regularity.

Suddenly, with a flaunt of its bushy tail and a daring, backward glance,
it scampered under the gate into Miss Ainslie's garden and Winfield
laughed aloud. He had not known he was so near the other house and was
about to retreat when something stopped him.

Miss Ainslie stood in the path just behind the gate, with her face
ghastly white and her eyes wide with terror, trembling like a leaf.
There was a troubled silence, then she said, thickly, "Go!"

"I beg your pardon," he answered, hurriedly, "I did not mean to frighten
you."

"Go!" she said again, her lips scarcely moving, "Go!"

"Now what in the mischief have I done;" he thought, as he crept away,
feeling like a thief. "I understood that this was a quiet place and yet
the strenuous life seems to have struck the village in good earnest.

"What am I, that I should scare the