I said no more, but sat silent for a little, watching her across the fallen manuscript of ancient romances. Presently I picked up the sheets, and by chance my look fell on the very thing for which we had been searching: the story of the wife of Kiala, a Wisconsin Indian chief who was sold into slavery and carried to Martinique. And alone, across those hundreds of miles of pathless snow and sea, the wife of Kiala somehow followed him to the door of his West Indian owner. And to him she gave herself into slavery so that she might be with her husband. I read the story to Miggy. And because the story is true, and because it happened so near and because of this universe in general, I was not able to read it quite so tranquilly as I should have wished. "Oh," Miggy said, "is it like _that_?" Yes, please God; if the heart is big enough to hold it, it is like that. Miggy put her hand down quickly on the blue muslin dress she wore. "My mother knew!" she said. And that is the most wonderful thing of all: one's mother knew. Miggy turned once more and looked out the window at Peter. Bless Peter! I think that he must have been over that grass with the mower quite twice--perhaps twice and a half. Almost immediately Miggy looked away from Peter, and I thought--though perhaps after all it was merely the faint colour that often hovers in her cheek. I felt, however, that if I had again suggested to Miggy that we ask Peter to lunch, Peter might possibly have lunched with us. But now I did not suggest it. No, if ever it gets to be "all Peter with Miggy," it must be so by divine non-interference. My little voice-friend up there on the shelf, the Westminster chimes, struck twelve, in its manner of sweet apology for being to blame for things ending. In the village we lunch at twelve, and so my forenoon was done and even the simple tasks I had set were not all finished. I wonder, though, if deep within this fond forenoon we have not found something--wings, or a light, or a singing--that was of the spirit of the tasks? I wish that I thought so with reasons which I could give to a scientist. At all events I am richly content. And over our luncheon Miggy has just flattered me unconscionably. "My!" she said, "I should think everybody would want to be Secretary." VII AFRAID I must turn aside to tell of Allen and Christopha, that young husband and wife whose first adventure, Miggy thought, was like something sweet and bright and long ago. It happened this last winter, but I cannot perceive any grave difference between that winter night and this June. Believe me, the seasons and the silences and we ourselves are not so different as we are alike.