Her volley of words was swift, her movement swifter. The breath was still warm on his cheek as he reached out with a cry. But once more she was bounding up the path, light as the wind in her hair. He heard her laughing as she ran, plunged a few steps after, but halted as he saw her, without a glance behind, overtake the plodding figure of Habakkuk. It was ended, she was right. The two moved slowly over the crest, sank to their shoulders in the shimmering grasses of the sky-line. For a time the black cap of the one, the bright head of the other, went bobbing and dwindling against the whiteness of a cloud. Then these also blurred into the rim, and sank. A wind--the first wind of early autumn--followed them over the hill, whitening the grass in little scallops and waves, in puffs and whirls, and sudden scurrying lines, like the breath of a colorless flame, passing incessantly upward. He stood watching, alone with the wind and the cloud. When at last he gave over, and wheeled about, the whole valley was darkened and vacated. He did not see it, or the house, or the river, for in this opposite direction lay only something unpalatable, necessary, with a short name that was no less trite than wonderful. Toward that he went downhill resolutely, eager to begin, anxious, exulting, like a man who has set his face toward the wars. The Riverside Press CAMBRIDGE · MASSACHUSETTS U · S · A * * * * * * Transcriber’s note: Obvious typographical errors have been corrected. Inconsistencies in hyphenation have been standardized.