DAWN etched a shadowy lace of pine branches across the window of the Lady Ariel's Pine Bough Chamber, and with a quick thrill of realization Jean rose. In the night the rain had turned to snow, lightly thatching the ground in white, and ghost-like through the dawn loomed Aunt Cheerful's pines, hung with snowy tippets of ragged fur. From her window, Jean wonderingly watched a sturdy little figure appear among the pines below and halt at the wood-pile where he busily began to split kindlings, whistling very softly to himself and glancing furtively at the silent cottage. The kindlings neatly stacked on the cottage porch, this rosy-cheeked little wood-chopper of the dawn briskly swept the snow from the walks and porch, carefully removed a sodden sheet of paper from the trim garden, and vanished stealthily again among the pines. Now although Lady Ariel was never quite sure just how it all came about, night found her still at Pine Tree Cottage, and again at dawn she watched Lord Chesterfield at his furtive tasks. And so, eventually, swept away again and again by the warmth of Aunt Cheerful's hospitality, Jean came to linger on at the cottage in the pines, thrilled unaccountably by the unquestioning friendliness of her cheery hostess. Each night when the mail train came in, Aunt Cheerful's lamp flashed its friendly message through the pines; each night her birdlike voice carried its invitation into the dark of the lane. And sometimes it was a weary villager, homing through the twilight, who answered her call and sometimes an astonished stranger lured into the lane by the smell of the pine and the brightness of her light. But to all the welcome was the same. Aunt Cheerful's cosmic hospitality made no distinctions, and presently Jean came to know that the fame of Pine Tree Cottage was county-wide. And as regularly as the lamp flashed among the pines, so in mid-evening came Lord Chesterfield with his Lady's mail and her paper, his courteous queries for her Ladyship's health and his relishful exposition of the village news. Brave, kindly little hermit! Jean's heart warmed to his boyish gallantry. And presently when the first constraint had worn away, Lord Chesterfield's courtly queries from the window-sill included the health of the Lady Ariel.