The Birmingham age-herald., 1908-01-26

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 the winding roadway two or three
 times. It was the same in which Elm 1 ma smith wash ed her clothes. and from
 which Cf she were not carefully watch l ed) she would silly abstract the cook ing water, instead of going three hum l dred yards farther to the little spring Of sweet water, called Captain Yaw- kin's We'll, that nestled just under the 1 high Heughs of Portogarten Indeed
 it is like enough that the old bucca-
 neer-smuggler had tasted that clean l cool brew, mingling it with a caulk- CT of his latest cargo, just to show that there was no i'll feeling on either side. Immediately above the old mill tn @ { braeside began to feather first into
 bracken and primrose, according to their season, or the taller yellow broom "a brazen Haunting beauty she. Then a little higher up. after the path had
 done winding round certain knoll from which you could see far below you the road to Kirktown. began the light stippled foliage of the birches the covering hairy-leaved hazels, that stick to the skirts and brush .-le face and above all (and last of alp mount ed the sweet sombre aisles of the frs
 Vida mounted slowly. It was not that she needed an excuse for going. That did not in the least trouble her. When MT Emerson met "the fresh Rhodora in the woods," and decided,
 quite correctly. that Eff eyes were made for seeing, then beauty was its own excuse for being" he settled Vida's case also. She had certainly and in disputably the identical same excuse for seeing and being seen.
 Still at intervals she blushed, as doubtless did the Rhodora-a plant of whose beauty we can only judge over here by pictures and the faded dessi- cation of museums-just because some one had seen her where she was. The watcher was not formidable He was, not even looking her way-an old man apparently, bending over a stick and letting himself slowly down the noun tain side. But Vida waited till he had passed away behind clump of trees towards the Kirktown road She breathed freely again, pulled a prim- rose to stick in her dress, surveyed it with her head on one side, decided that it was too short in the shank-besides which the color did not go with her complexion. Then she pulled strand or two of the broom blossom with stalks that were long enough to be set in her belt and retained a branch in her hand against the flies. It was too early in the year, really, for flies, but it looked nice, and one never knows when one may need a weapon of some sort
 She was going to see Phil,- since Phil had grown so cold-yes, and difficult. Well, perhaps it had been her fault. It is not a bad thing to neglect your Phil a little on purpose. If he goes off and plays with something or some body else, then-if you care about him, it Is time to take steps And you will care about him as never before.
 Perhaps that was why Vida's pa tience had been so long, Phil had only played with his mine.
 Indeed he was looking at his bal ance-sheet when a certain shadow ap- peared among the trees by the window. It was a source of some considerable pride to him-this balance-sheet. For the first time Phil had had enough to pay the men, without calling upon the cheaue- book of MT. Romer.
 The old man had just been there. He had said some kind words-going his way, however, with a sigh, because he felt that the time of his little providence was drawing to close. He would soon, if all went we'll be reaping where he had sown and gathering where he had straWed-operatons with which he was sufficiently familiar for them to have lost all novelty. His kind friends of Incubus
 & Co.,, were quite wrong about him on this occasion.
 But the figure, mounting higher on the sprinlzIed sunshine upon the long folio of paper which had earned the applause of MT Romer, startled Phil at his ac-
 counts At last Vida was coming down the track of the sunbeams towards him.
 out of the pine alleys-the same into
 which he had ten minutes before, seen her father vanish.
 She seemed a reward of merit. Joyous, gay, the light of afternoon misty and luminous about her. Vida was trans figured to the eyes of the young man.
 She smiled at him through the panes of glass-like the embodiment of hap pier world She seemed made for other destinies-to have her card filled first at ball (Phil loathed balls), to garner as
 in a sheaf the applause of crowded the atres (Phil abhorred theatres). Yet for all that she had come to see him, the yellow of the spring gold laid against
 the black of her hair, the green and yellow of the broom in her hand, no
 more pliant than her young body! Yet she smiled, and-was it dream ?-kissed her hand daintily to him through the
 meagre lattices of the little wooden build ing -half-office. Perhaps, Phil told himself, it was but the webs that the wood spiders had woven which had waited themselves across his eyes, so | that he failed to see clearly.
 Yet he knew better-oh how much bet 1 ter.
 l So much better that he never made | a mistake, or thought that the girl meant | more than she wished him to think she 1 meant. Quick as a woman he knew, 1 and in addition, he had the gift of l stating the case exactly to himself | which women lack.
 "It is only pity" he said to himself ives, pity-not love. She is pitiful be- l cause she has treated me a little badly l after-after all she knows-all told her She has come up to talk, simply and | kindly, as I would have done to Rose | Nunsby because her heart is empty" | He would have liked to add, And l will fill 1t for herl'
 But because he did not say so, nor yet | think it his chance of doing so was so
 much the greater.
 | "Afternoon, Phli' she cried in at the l door, in her quick, offhand manner, Are l you running the mill alone today? Where are all your grimy cohorts? I thought
 you were so busy saying to this man 1 Go and to the other 'Come'-that you had not found time to run down to see usv'
 "You forget" said Phil, gently pulling l out his watch, as if it would tell him the
 day of the week. but this is Saturday
 afternoon"
 "Why, what difference does that make, Phil?" she said, smiling past the to-and- 1 fro wave of the broom branch before
 her dancing eyes.
 1 Phil had come to the door now. and
 they stood face to face. But they did | not shake hands. It did not seem worth l while. They were all to each other that l that meant, years and years ago Yet
 though they did not know it. their fate like that of many others who have as