“But how did you know her name was Miss Rowantree?” Azalea asked, or started to ask. Before she had finished her question she saw on the child’s dark blue reefer a piece of cloth, neatly sewn in place, and with these words on it in indelible ink: “Constance Rowantree. Please see that she leaves the train at Rowantree Road.” “You’re terrible young to be traveling alone, child,” said Aunt Zillah seriously. “How ever could they let you do it?” “I got so homesick they had to,” explained the child with equal gravity. “Nobody could come with me, so I had to come alone. I don’t mind,” she added valiantly. “I hope you reach your home before dark,” went on Aunt Zillah, quite at ease now that she had somebody to worry about. “Oh, yes, ma’am,” the child answered, “I’ll get home a long time before sundown, and my father will meet me.” She spoke in such a slow and particular fashion that she made them all smile. “That’s all right then,” said Azalea cheerfully, who was afraid the little girl was having some fears manufactured for her. “Now, please tell me the name of your doll.” “It’s Mary Cecily Rowantree, after my mamma,” said the little girl. “Isn’t that a pretty name?” “Pretty as a song,” said the youth, who was still standing by them. “I wish it was my name,” the little girl added. “I’m only named Constance.” “But that’s a lovely name,” Carin told her. “It means that you will always have to be true to those you love.” “I love ever so many people,” said the child. “And I’m going to keep right on loving them as long as I live.” They chatted on for a while, as congenial folk will on the train. No doubt if Azalea had been left to herself she would frankly have told her new acquaintances just where she and her friends were going and what they intended to do, but the more reserved Carin and the cautious Miss Zillah forbade, by their eyes, any such confidences. So, after Constance had finished telling how a lady named Miss Todd has come to live with them for a while, and how she had taken her—Constance—home with her, and how Constance had stayed till the “spell” of homesickness conquered her, no more confidences were made save by the young man. “This country’s new to me,” he told them. “But I’ve heard a lot about it, so I came up to see what it was like. You see, I’m a painter. At least if I keep on working for the next twenty years maybe I’ll become one. I’ve been sketching on the islands off the Carolina coast, and now I’m going to see what I can do with the mountains. I painted some pictures of the sea that were so bad the tide didn’t come in for three days and maybe I can make the mountains so enraged that they’ll skip like lambs. Anyway, it will be fun.” “Where do you get off?” asked Azalea cheerfully. “Hanged if I know,” the youth replied, turning on them again the radiance of his beautiful smile. “Any place that looks wild enough will get me.”