What manner of man could her father be--this man Herold--to have a child of this sort, this finely molded, fine-grained, delicate, exquisitely made girl, lying asleep here in a wind-stirred blind, with the Creator's own honest sun searching out and making triumphant a beauty such as his wise and city-worn eyes had never encountered, even under the mercies of softened candlelight. An imbecile repetition of speech kept recurring and even stirring his lips, "She'd make them all look like thirty cents." And he colored painfully at the crudeness of his obsessing thoughts, angrily, after a moment, shaking them from him. A cartridge rolled from the shelf and splashed into the pit water; the girl unclosed her gray eyes, met his gaze, smiled dreamily; then, flushing a little, sat up straight. "Fifteen widgeon went off when I returned to the blind," he said, unsmiling. "I _beg_ your pardon. I am--I am terribly sorry," she stammered, with a vivid blush of confusion. But the first smile from her unclosing eyes had already done damage enough; the blush merely disorganized a little more what was already chaos in a young man's mind. "Has--has anything else come in to the stools?" she asked timidly. "No," he said, relenting. But he was wrong. Something _had_ come into the blind--a winged, fluttering thing, out of the empyrean--and even Uncle Dudley had not seen or heard it, and never a honk or a quack warned anybody, or heralded the unseen coming of the winged thing. Marche sat staring out across the water. "I--am so very sorry," repeated the girl, in a low voice. "Are you offended with me?" He turned and looked at her, and spoke steadily enough: "Of course I'm not. I was glad you had a nap. There has been nothing doing--except those stupid widgeon--not a feather stirring." "Then you are not angry with me?" "Why, you absurd girl!" he said, laughing and stretching out one hand to her. Into her face flashed an exquisite smile; daintily she reached out and dropped her hand into his. They exchanged a friendly shake, still smiling. "All the same," she said, "it was horrid of me. And I think I boasted to you about my knowledge of a bayman's duties." "You are all right," he said, "a clean shot, a thoroughbred. I ask no better comrade than you. I never again shall have such a comrade." "But--I am your bayman, not your comrade," she exclaimed, forcing a little laugh. "You'll have better guides than I, Mr. Marche." "Do you reject the equal alliance I offer, Miss Herold?" "I?" She flushed. "It is very kind of you to put it that way. But I _am_ only your guide--but it is pleasant to have you speak that way." "What way?" "The way you spoke about--your bayman's daughter." He said, smilingly cool on the surface, but in a chaotic, almost idiotic inward condition: "I've sat here for days, wishing all the while that I might really know you. Would you care to let me, Miss Herold?" "Know me?" she repeated. "I don't think I understand."