"No, thanks; it is only clean sand." A tuft of soft green grass furnished a ready mat, on which she wiped her small foot, not invisible to Burr while he modestly inspected the mussel shells and polished pebbles washed ashore by the plashing ripples. From the beach he picked a bone-like fragment resembling milky quartz. This he brought to the lady, who had chosen a mossy seat on the trunk of a fallen sycamore. "It is a lucky-stone," she remarked. "It brings fortune." "I will send it to Theodosia," said the finder, pocketing the treasure. A pensive mood had succeeded the anxious wife's elation. She gazed across the river expectantly. Not a rowboat in sight, excepting a skiff lying alongside the scow. "I fear he is having needless bother. How miserable! Our slaves are a burden, not worth the trifles they pilfer. I wish they would all run away, then we might have an excuse for flying." "And could you leave your earthly paradise?" "Yes; though I am attached to the island. I should regret to lose the trees, the river, the sky." "Earth and sky stretch far. I sympathize with your feeling for the place. I told your husband it was like Bunyan's Enchanted Ground. Beulah, however, and the Delectable Mountains lie beyond the Enchanted Ground." "More poetry!" "Could I make verse, I would sing of October in the Ohio Valley, or of Indian Summer, which comes in November, don't it?" She glanced up inquiringly. He held some leaves of pink paper covered with writing, recognizing which, she flushed. "How did you come by that? Did he--?" She made a motion as if to take the paper. Burr, pretending not to see the gesture, began to read in a low voice, infusing into the verse more thought and sentiment than it contained. His perfect reading gave the commonplace stanzas aesthetic effect. The authoress confessed their merit to her secret soul. "I am vexed that Harman gave you that. It is silly stuff." "On the contrary, it is literature. You don't know, madam, how good it is. I have a favor to beg; allow this poem to be printed in the _Port Folio_. I know the editor, Jo Dennie, and shall call and give him this copy when I reach Philadelphia. You will not deny me this pleasure?" Confident that she would not take offense he slid the lines on Indian Summer into his breast pocket, to keep company with the lucky-stone. The situation had become riskily sentimental and intensely stimulating to Burr's disposition as a social trifler. He was reckless of consequences, vain of conquest over any woman, and scrupulous only to avoid failure in his amours. The more innocent and virtuous the victim, the keener and more careful was he in pursuit. To entrap unsuspecting game without exciting alarm he considered the most exquisite art of gallantry. What sport it was to entangle this superb creature in a web of invisible gossamer threads! "Tell me more about your Theodosia. Have you a picture of her?"