The Adventures of Bobby Orde

llowed. On Sunday he took her on his regular ex

as no Sunday School to-d

ay School,"

d short and

church too?

it," s

like pol

h,

ripy s

're h

fo

n't k

es an' r

fraid o

do

e got one home. H

ad not liked dogs. He merely wished to be near her. When he left her he immediately experienced the strongest longing to be again where he could see her, and breathe the deep, intoxicating, delicious, clean influence of her near presence. And yet with her his moments of unalloyed happiness were few and his hours of sheer misery were many. Self-consciou

the immediate spell of the dancing, sprite-like, sunny little girl. No thought of the especial effort to please, called courtship, entered his young head. He played with the children,

LETON and

ce the somebody of the impertinent chalk had fathomed his devotion to her, might it not be possible, oh, remotely inconceivably possible, of course, that the unknown had equally marked some slight interest on her part for him? The board fence, the maple-shaded walk, the soft brown street of pulverized shingles, all faded in the rapt glory of this vision. Bobby gasped. Literally it had not occurred to him before. Now all at once he desired it, desired it not merely with every power of his child nature, but with the full strength of the man's soul that waited but the passing of years to spread

him; and a deep sense of his unworthiness. What could she, accustomed to brilliant creatures of the wonderful city, of whom Geral

ery night, Bobby had ready cut and dried a half-dozen different ways in which to ask the question, and tw

e need of finding out whether she cared for him as he had never conceived a need could exist; yet he was totally unable to satisfy it. By comparison the former misery of jealousy seemed nothing. Bobby lived constantly in this high breathless state of delight in Celia; and misery in the

over and over for a perfect result-unblurred, well-registered, we

he wrapped them in a clumsy package, and set ou

a alone in a

down this morning?" s

e package and lo

," sa

it?" she crie

it," sai

nsisted Celia.

the package firml

he, "and we got a fine fort over the hill, and I know where there

you've got!"

his plan, "if you'll com

reath; "I'll tell mamma I'm goin

others to go," ann

stillness, and looked

e agreed quietl

shop windows did not detain them, as ordinarily. At the fire-engine house they turne

go th

untering Angus, or pe

flushed, her eyes bright, the tiniest curls about her forehead wet and matted with perspiration. With a great adoration, Bobby looked upon her slender figure held straight against the blue sky.

er this way,"

ackage first,"

cards, and thrust t

aid hastily. "I did the

ay so at length, but Bobby had his

e the fort,"

r uses, and pointed out the enemy of stumps charging

OST DARED

e way they did in the

in the Colonies,' too

ad never exchanged such ideas as their years had developed. For once Bobby forgot the fact of his love, and its delicious pains, and its need for something which he could not place, in the unselfconscious joy of intimat

ad a good tim

announcing the resting-places. There was a wood-road up the hill, but they preferred the steep side. Trees shaded it; and undergrowth veiled it. Little open spaces were guarded mysteriously and jealously by the thickets; little hot pockets held like cups the warmth of the sun. Birds flashed and disappeared; squirrels chattered indignantly; chipmunks scurried away. Occasionally they came to dense

of the straightest. For many years their recollection of that hill was as

way, I'll show y

ey looked abroad over the countryside. They could see the snake-fences about the farms, and the white dusty road like a

he lost captaincy of his soul. The self-confidence which he lacked seeped gradually into him; and he began, though very tentatively, to recognize and respect his own value as an individual. These are big words to employ over the small

eir legs denied them in the matter of actual distance, the la

he yellow shore and the blue lake. Long years after he could remember it vividly, and all the little details that belonged to it-the flash of the waters, the dip of gulls, the gentle wash of the quiet wavelets against the shore, the thin strip of dark wet sand that marked the extent of their influences, and, in a long curve to the blue of distance, the une