mind on that eventful day to invest in all
those wonderful manifestations of nature's power and nature's
mystery.

During their circuitous meanderings, two young men joined Miss Josey
and were duly presented to her _protege_. They were fine young
fellows, and very pleasant, too, but Mell continued so preoccupied in
the vain racking of her brain, trying to imagine what had become of
Jerome and Clara Rutland, that she did not catch their names, and
replied to their efforts at conversation with monosyllabic remarks.
One of them, a merry-tempered, straightforward, stalwart young chap,
armed with rod and bait, asked her, with a flattering degree of
warmth, if she wouldn't go with them a-fishing; but reflecting if she
did so, she would in all likelihood be out of the way of seeing Jerome
for hours to come, Mell declined without circumlocution, glad to get
rid of him on the pretext of having promised to assist Miss Josey in
her onerous duties, as commissary of subsistence. Discouraged, the
young fisherman bowed and left.

"Such a pretty girl," he remarked to his companion. "It's a pity she
doesn't know what to say!"

Think of Mell Creecy not knowing what to say! The girl who was always
saying things nobody else had ever thought of saying. Such is the
pretty pass to which an unhappy love may bring the brightest girl!
And, after all, she saw absolutely nothing of Jerome until all those
wagon upon wagon loads of baskets had been ransacked, and their
tempting contents emptied out upon the festive board, giving forth
grateful suggestions of the coming mid-day meal.

While squeezing lemons, flushed and more than ever anxious, deft of
hand, but uneasy in mind, the buggy containing Jerome and Miss Rutland
dashed into the grove.

"We've been all the way to Pudney," called out the young lady, holding
up to view some tied-up boxes, "and here are the prizes."

"All right," responded Miss Josey, "but do let us have the ice. The
prizes are of no consequence to a famishing people, but the dinner is,
and we are about ready."

"She's powerfully interested in the prizes," commented a girl at
Mell's elbow, "but she has a good right to be."

"Why?" inquired Mell.

"Because she is going to be crowned queen of love and beauty."

"How do you know?"

"I've put things together, and that's the way they sum up to me. That
young man with her can beat all of our boys, and he's going to crown
her."

"Is he?" ejaculated Mell.

Let him da