The Innocent Adventuress

me for concern to spre

crossed the river on those wide, flat stepping-stones that Johnny Byrd had missed, and re-formed

her mother, Mrs. Blair only glanced over her shoulder a

ficantly with young Byrd, and she made a point of suggesting to Ruth, when she passed her in

nny do it," and cheerfully she went on photographing a group upon a fallen log,

nor Johnny Byrd would relish such attendance, promp

her own particular w

e current of his admiration for her, and now seemed to have been brought up on very def

ary reserved for independent American girls

Bob Martin wanted her-and then she wanted affairs to stand still

ob Martin in the scene. But if he were unsatisfied he w

pursuing

itation satisfactorily to herself, so she had made rat

ehensible aversion about shutting the door to other adventures, and part of it was her native energy

he would have loved to have gone over there, and known the mud and do

hadn't a doubt but that everything was all ri

sn't going

hful masculinity but that she didn't care enough. And his

sion, much searching of wills and hearts and motives, a threaten

Angelina and her compa

d again a part of the general group that Ruth had the tho

their time," sh

gave back with a disgruntled ai

limb," she said. "This little o

t arm will do the work,"

missed the way?" Mrs. Blair, overhearing, suggested, an

the idea of

he predicted easily, and Mrs. Blair turned to the arrangement of supper

agging of theirs. She might have expected it of Johnny Byrd-he had a way of makin

soon as you gave those cloistere

charge. Julia Martin, a youthful aunt

iasm, as she and Mrs. Blair delved into a hamper that the Marti

't see how her mother dared

her to see America,"

e night after the dance," she added in a lower voice. "Bob and his mother are perfectly mad. I think they want to kill their guests off-perhaps

ave this," she went on, "before she really knows Roman society. . . . She will come out as soon as she returns from Ameri

auty," said the intuitive Miss Martin with a laugh. "Perhaps

th this preliminary experience, I fancy that lit

pilgrimage was only a prelude in Maria Angelina's career, and she

ul aunt was no

re if she carries off the Byrd m

ished she could smack that loitering child. . . . Very certainly she would betray no degrading

child," said sh

now and very much a catch-all his vacations used to be hairbreadth escapes. Of

tion possible, although-extenuation made haste to add within her-no one could humanly be expected to

ower with strong accents of sympathy. "Climb too mu

ld only be sure she wasn't hurt-or

Lost-on a straight trail. Not

or necks. And she wasn't alone to get lost. She just gave up and Johnny Byrd took her ho

anation they de

appearing sensibly at ease, although the nervous haste with which a sudden noi

he affair, inventing fresh reasons for the absent one

last night," the ten

. Curiosity preoccupied some; uneasiness communicated itself to others. And the

king a party go and Maria Angelina's sweet soprano had become so much

Angelina than her sopr

ent-minded. The crack young polo player thought the s

ather was

n effort at singing about it, a dispirited silence spread until a decen

ket flashlights, so down in the dark they started, proceeding cautiously and gingerly, and accumulating mental reservations about mo

em, and the first of the gusty showers sent them hurrying

their toes and giving us the laugh," predicte

n her upward trip. Bob seemed very stable, very desirable, as she stumbled wearily on. She wasn't quite sure what she ha

ly to be unready for surrender. She

him back a quick loo

as she broke from him

in readiness and with perfunctory warmth of farewells the tire

"He's probably inside--" and Bob swu

ned the door into the wide hall where a

Ruth went to the door of the music room. It was deserted. Mrs

lina had not returned, to the clerk's kn

nd sped up the stairs only to return in a f

announced in a voice th

hings were there?" said her m

er glance with s

are simply lost, as Ruth says. Wait-I must tell them before t

n her daughter a fa

refully. "I felt it all

ghtly, with an indisputable lift of e

uneasily to meet the advan

e to throw out, before she had to voice the best p

bble of facile

be here any

em up-they were safe a

could happen-it wasn't a

worry. As soon as it was light so

lost all night and breakfasted o

happen to her-with

e of her-by morning every

ad it happened? That w

ne Blair. It was the question, she knew, that they were

ned? And how h