The Wild Olive

grees she provided him with a complete change of raiment, and though the fit was tolerable, they laughed together at the transformation produced in him. It was the first time

ing with the instinct of his race th

," the girl declared, surv

" he asked, with a new attempt to pen

ion of him. "They were sent to me, and I kept them. I

n a tall man?" Fo

that the admission required some explanation, she added, with a

ied a long

reluctantly, af

ong-about four

't seen him since

mustn't talk. Some one

had come in to perform for him arose not so much from preca

uld tell me his n

left in confusion, but she remained silent. It was a silence i

me his name?"

ldn't convey anything to you. It wo

ty. I should think you might

you as it is. I don't thin

elf did it so simply, so much as a matter of course, that the circumstance lost much of its strangeness. Now and then he could detect some confusion in her manner as she served him, but he could see too that she surmounted it, in view of the fact that for him the situation was one of life and death. She was clearly not indiff

he inquired, on the next occa

with a look

Where do

live; where you

a few months a

, you live somew

iss me there, if that's

pologetically, "that you were g

it. I shall be only too glad

ould you car

simply; "at least, I

elping me just-on

ite

ed, "mayn't I a

don't lik

ike the law as a whole?-or

, "we mustn't talk any more now. Some men passed here this morning, and they may be coming back. They've given

at day, and the next she remained at

the hunt altogether. They say there's not a spot within a radius of ten miles of Greenport that they haven't searched. It would never occ

emorse at betrayin

l pleased to think you've got away; and even if they weren't I

e a great object

haven

y case it's co

mine-if you

ily, "this is as good a time as any to a

ing; but as she stroked Micmac'

he crime of which th

r some intimation

as plausible enough, I admit. The only wea

the suspension of expression in her bearing, and coul

ou-your uncle?-wasn't h

't be a reason for shooting him in his sle

think it

or the necessity of making n

bloodthirsty

uld do. My father wouldn't have submitted to it. I know

led under

a pause, "your objection

. The world is full of injustice," she added, in

im is to de

are very quiet you can sit in the studio and read; but you mustn't look out at the window, or even draw back the curtain. If you hear a step outs

she said, and give him the outlines only when she had settled them. It chanced to be a day of drenching summer rain, and Ford,

t I do," she said, indifferen

wandering on old Wayne's terrace, just in the nick of time. What stu

As a matter of fact, I had worke

nt up incredulo

ast year-I've imagined how easy it would be for some-some hunted person to stay hidden

ing better to do very often," he

ght I couldn't do without a studio-till I got one. But when I've co

pe. It wouldn't be every girl's fancy, b

he declared, as if in self-justification. "A

her! Who

boyish impulse to talk, he was surprised

interval in which she seemed to be mak

lty she had in speaking

of Gilbert à Becket-Thomas

eived in silence, as she bent ov

ped him out of prison," Ford

her head an

ory of Gilbert à Becke

ndered in vain had it not been for the flush that gradually over-spread her features, and brought what he

n," he stammered.

ow.... You've asked me so many questions that it seemed as if I was ashamed of my father and mother wh

ramed sketches on the chimney-piece. Her

right. I meant

rain protected them against intrusion from outside. During their conversation she had been placing the easel and arranging the work which fo

he ventured to ask, as she seated

Canadian voyageur. I believe she had a strain of Indian

himself at a distance, gazing at her with a kind of fascination. Here, then, was the clew to that something untamed which persisted through all the effects of training and education, as a wild fl

seemed to be assimilating the information she had gi

ot any more than your s

e perfectly, because I'm

I'm made to suffer because I'

e exclaimed, in boyish sym

y. "And yet I'd rather suffer with the par

natural," he adm

touches to the work before her, and now and then leaning back to get

en he killed the m

a settled life; and so he wandered away into the northwest of Canada. It was in the days when they first began to build the rai

didn't st

my father sent me down to Quebec, to the Ursuline nuns. He never saw

his people? Hadn't he siste

ey wouldn't have any

might have been free. Her way of twisting her dark hair-which waved over the brows from a central parting-into the simplest kind of knot gave her an air of sedateness beyond her years. But what he noticed in her particularly was her eyes-not so much because they were wild, dark eyes, with the peculiar fleeing expression of startled forest things, a

at deal of money," she sighed

he had

eplace. I've been told that it changed my father's life. He had been what they call wild before that-but he wasn't so any more. He grew very hard-working and serious. He was on

in the convent?" he ask

d me. It wasn't until after my father died, and I began to realize-who I was, that I g

did you g

tly to herself

here are no peo

to lay on this circumstance, he grasped at t

a guardian! How

ry sweet and gentle, and all that, but she's devoted to the proprieties of life, and I seem to represent to

you stay

can't help myself. I have t

The la

. But I've other re

ch

thing. She's the greatest darling in the world, a

s her

eptible contraction of her brows into a little frown, and the setting of her lips into a curve of determination. They were handsome lips, mobile and s

, after long reflection. "It will be safer for yo

ape-I should li

you may be abl

ssumed indifference, "since

n talking to a lady-a girl-was undeniable. Sometimes in his moments of solitary meditation he said to himself that she was "not his type of girl"; but the fact that he had been deprived of feminine society for nearly three years made him

ne reason for your stayi

social communion by the readine

et I might as well. It's just this: they're not ve

ls. That's all very fine if you

y way it gives you a sense of being of use to some one. I'd rather that people n

eclared, with a young man's

get one, even if you have to buy it. My guardian and his wife mayn't care much to have me

It's curious-the effect imprisonment has on you. It takes away your self-reliance. It gives you

ir, with his arms folded on the back, he felt a fraternal element in their mutu

long all right. Y

easy t

ile she continued to flick color into her sketch, caused

t say t

because the moon

e Argenti

. Other people h

hey weren't

m were proba

ed absorbed in her work, while Ford sat

tine into your head

unities. I know people who've lived there. The little girl I was speaking of just now-whom I'

ing the same tuneless, abstract

Stephens and Jarrott. It's a very good firm to work for. I've often

e just his

the domestic place she had not inherited she reminded him of something he had read-or heard-of the wild olive being grafted into the olive of the orchard. Well, that would come in the natural course of events. Some fine fellow, worthy to be her mate, would see to it. He was not without a pleasant belief that in happier circumstances he himself might have had the qualificat