Roxie herself might have found difficulty in explaining why she kept so tight within doors, for it was not wholly on account of Bud Childers. True enough the man had been pestering her; had followed her home against her will and made his threats. And yet when quite honest with herself she knew she was not afraid of him. He might pinch her arm with his big hand, and he might scowl, and he might say he was going to do this and do that, but in the end what could he do? Once she had cowed him with a smile, and once again she had said to him in a voice hardly above a whisper: “Bud Childers--stop.” And he had stopped. It had given her a new sense of power. He was more a nuisance than anything else--a nuisance at a time when she wanted to be left alone with her thoughts. If Bud had been able to read these, he would have waited even more restlessly than he did, down there by the ford. There were others, too, who might have grown restless. But the thoughts of a young woman, until she chooses to voice them, are her own. They are her sacred city. Bold adventurers or the merely curious may try to enter through the eyes and guess what lies behind, but it is more than probable they will guess wrong. At any rate, they can never know with certainty if only the lady keeps her lips sealed. And that, Roxie--cross her throat and hope to die--meant to do. It was her one excuse for not at the very beginning running from her dreams like a startled fawn. She could not be blamed for getting them--they came from around a corner as suddenly as Allston’s machine had that day; but she could be blamed for keeping them. Way down deep in her romantic little heart--where half of what she knew came from--she understood her danger. It was one thing to have a fairy prince safe within the covers of a story-book, where he could be shut in again at the end of the day, and quite another to have him walking around the house in flesh and blood, sometimes within arm’s length, where closing a door upon him did no good whatever. Because often enough she could still hear his voice as he talked to Miss Wilmer or at least hear his footsteps as he strode about his room. Allston had risked his life to save her life. That was the beginning of her dream. He had done a fine thing, as a prince might do it--head up, a smile on his lips, and quietly. He had staked his life for hers--even when she was at fault. And this gave a new value to her life. It gave a new dignity. One moment she was nothing much to any one; the next, more than a king’s ransom--a king’s son--had been offered for her. If, after this, he had vanished, it would still have been safe for Roxie to dream on. Princes are harmless enough until they begin to stalk around in the daytime. Then they become dangerous--however well meaning.