fire,
hesitated, wavered; then the possibility passed; the young fellow
lowered the gun, slowly, gravely; stood a moment motionless with bent
head until the rising colour in his face had faded.

And that was all, for a while. The astonished and disgusted keeper
stared into the thicket; the dog lay quivering, impatient for signal.
Sylvia's heart, which had seemed to stop with her voice, silenced in the
gusty thunder of heavy wings, began beating too fast. For the ringing
crack of a gun shot could have spoken no louder to her than the
glittering silence of the suspended barrels; nor any promise of his
voice sound as the startled stillness sounded now about her. For he had
made something a trifle more than mere amends for his rudeness. He was
overdoing everything--a little.

He stood on the thicket's edge, absently unloading the weapon, scarcely
understanding what he had done and what he had not done.

A moment later a far hail sounded across the uplands, and against the
sky figures moved distantly.

"Alderdene and Marion Page," said Siward. "I believe we lunch yonder, do
we not, Miles?"

They climbed the hill in silence, arriving after a few minutes to
find others already at luncheon--the Page boys, eager, enthusiastic,
recounting adventure by flood and field; Rena Bonnesdel tired and
frankly bored and decorated with more than her share of mud; Eileen
Shannon, very pretty, very effective, having done more execution with
her eyes than with the dainty fowling-piece beside her.

Marion Page nodded to Sylvia and Siward with a crisp, business-like
question or two, then went over to inspect their bag, nodding
approbation as Miles laid the game on the grass.

"Eight full brace," she commented. "We have five, and an odd
cock-pheasant--from Black Fells, I suppose. The people to our left have
been blazing away like Coney Island, but Rena's guide says the ferns are
full of rabbits that way, and Major Belwether can't hit fur afoot. You,"
she added frankly to Siward, "ought to take the cup. The birches ahead
of you are full of woodcock. If you don't, Howard Quarrier will. He's
into a flight of jack-snipe I hear."

Siward's eyes had suddenly narrowed; then he laughed, patting Sagamore's
cheeks. "I don't believe I shall shoot very steadily this afternoon,"
he said, turning toward the group at luncheon under the trees. "I wish
Quarrier well--with the cup."

"Nonsense," said Marion Page curtly; "you are the cleanest shot I eve