It was an afternoon early in July that Brooke was searching along the foot-path in the hemlock woods above the Fenton’s for the flowers of pipsissewa, with their wax petals and spicy wood fragrance, when the snapping of twigs made her turn, and striding down the hill, straight into the light, with quick, elastic step, came Robert Stead, a new, alert expression on his well-tanned face that wiped at least half a dozen years from his time record. Brooke was surprised and also frankly glad. Dropping her flowers, she held out both her hands and told him so. “As this is the first word from you in five long weeks, it is well that it is a kind one,” he replied. Then, holding her off, he looked at her as if to make sure it was she herself, and not the masquerading gypsy girl whose image always rose and came between them when he met her out-of-doors. “Ah, so much has happened since then! but Adam has written it all, except perhaps that now I may hope to go to Washington for next winter to study. That is quite far off, however, so tell me about yourself, also how working has agreed with you!” she added mischievously. “Work! They tell the truth—those that call it the master-word that unlocks all barriers! Child, child, do you know what you have done for me by acting and teaching it, so that now to me life, that was ended (as far as joy is life), has but begun? “Not only the desire for work, but the motive, came from you—is you! You have the magic crystal of youth, I hold anew the power to shield it; you have the fire of genius, I the fuel to feed its flame! Come to me, Brooke; with you only I can forget, forgive! Redeem the past for me!” As he paused with arms extended, Brooke shrank backward against the trunk of a great hemlock, bewildered, dizzy almost, by the sudden fierceness of his passion, confounded by the meaning that now banished what was friendship. She moistened her lips nervously and tried to speak, but found no words. Hardly noticing her silence, he swept on: “Listen, and you will believe that I know love at last. Ever since the day I met you by the trout stream, I have understood how Helen could give up all to save her lover. Why do you shrink? Is it all too sudden, my rebirth? Did you not even guess?” Brooke steadied herself with difficulty and merely shook her head. Stead leaned toward her and would have clasped her in his arms, but something in her face held him at bay. “What is it, child? for God’s sake, don’t look so! I have frightened you! You welcomed me as a friend, why not a lover? Am I then too old for that?” and for an instant an iron frown drove the radiance from his face.