The flights through the city streets grew to be mere detail. She neither saw nor heeded the bustle and unrest. She was like a little, eager soul seeking, unerringly, its own. There was to be a time when Donelle would know the splendour and meaning of the City, but not then. She was conscious at that time only of the crude joy of existence near her love. He depended upon, watched for her; the maternal in her was so rapidly developed that at length Norval, from his dark place of helplessness, confided in her! "Your voice is tired," he said one day; they had been reading Olive Schreiner’s "Dreams." "Oh, no, I’m not tired, only the little Lost Joy sort of filled me up." That was an expression of Jo’s. "But it’s infernally true," Norval went on, "these ’Dreams’ are about as gripping as anything I know of. If we cannot have exactly what we want in life, we are as blind as bats to, perhaps, the thing that is better than our wishes." Then, so suddenly that Donelle drew back in alarm, he asked: "Are you a big young person, or a little one?" "Why, I’m thin, but I’m quite tall." The voice was sterner than Mary Walden could have evolved. "You think me rude, presuming?" "Oh! no, Mr. Norval. I was only wishing I was, well—rather nicer to talk about." Law, by the north window, went through a series of contortions that lightened the occasion. "You know, here in the dark where I live now, one has to imagine a lot. Lately I’ve wanted to know exactly—exactly as words can portray, just how you look. Andy?" "Yes, Jim. What’s up?" "Come here." Law came forward, smudgy and dauby, pallette on thumb. "Tell me how Miss Walden looks. I want to place her. She has a ghastly habit of escaping me when I’m alone and thinking her over. I can’t seem to fix her." "Well," Law stood off and regarded Donelle seriously, "She’s red headed and thin. She ought to be fed up. I don’t believe she can stand the city in summer. She doesn’t walk very well, she’s at her best when running." "Oh! Mr. Law." Donelle found herself laughing in spite of herself. "Well, you are. I’ve caught you running two or three times on the street. You looked as if you had your beginnings in wide spaces and could not forget them." "I—I am a country girl," the practical young voice almost broke. "I hate the city. Maybe I do run sometimes. I always feel that something is after me." "What?" asked Norval, and he, too, was laughing. His old depression seldom came now when his faithful reader was present. "I cannot describe it. I read a child’s story once about a Kicker. It was described as a big, round thing with feet pointing in every direction. One didn’t stand a chance when the Kicker got after him. The city seems like that to me. The round thing is full of noise, noise, noise; it just hurls itself along on its thousands of feet. I do run when I get thinking of it." Norval leaned his head back with a delighted chuckle.