d with me?"

She looked up with so much simplicity. "Offended, Rose, with you?"

"Not offended, but frozen," I could have said. Lu is like that little
sensitive-plant, shrinking into herself with stiff unconsciousness at a
certain touch. But I don't think he noticed the sad tone in her voice,
as she said good-night; I didn't, till, the others being gone, I saw her
turn after his disappearing figure, with a look that would have been
despairing, but for its supplication.

The only thing Lu ever said to me about this was,--

"Don't you think Rose a little altered, Yone, since he came home?"

"Altered?"

"I have noticed it ever since you showed him your beads, that day."

"Oh! it's the amber," I said. "They are amulets, and have bound him in a
thrall. You must wear them, and dissolve the charm. He's in a dream."

"What is it to be in a dream?" she asked.

"To lose thought of past or future."

She repeated my words,--"Yes, he's in a dream," she said, musingly.

II.

Rose didn't come near us for a fortnight; but he had not camped at all,
as he said. It was the first stone thrown into Lu's life, and I never
saw any one keep the ripples under so; but her suspicions were aroused.
Finally he came in again, all as before, and I thought things might have
been different, if in that fortnight Mr. Dudley had not been so
assiduous; and now, to the latter's happiness, there were several ragged
children and infirm old women in whom, Lu having taken them in charge,
he chose to be especially interested. Lu always was housekeeper, both
because it had fallen to her while mamma and I were away, and because
she had an administrative faculty equal to General Jackson's; and Rose,
who had frequently gone about with her, inspecting jellies and cordials
and adding up her accounts, now unexpectedly found Mr. Dudley so near
his former place that he disdained to resume it himself;--not entirely,
because the man of course couldn't be as familiar as an old playmate;
but just enough to put Rose aside. He never would compete with any one;
and Lu did not know how to repulse the other.

If the amulets had ravished Rose from himself, they did it at a
distance, for I had not worn them since that day.--You needn't look.
Thales imagined amber had a spirit; and Pliny says it is a counter-charm
for sorceries. There are a great many mysterious things in the world.
Aren't there any hidden relations between us and certain substances?
Will you tell m