Meanwhile Missy, the big ribbon index under her sailor-brim palpitantly askew, was progressing down Locust Avenue with a measured, accented gait that might have struck an observer as being peculiar. The fact was that the refrain vibrating through her soul had found its way to her feet. She'd hardly been conscious of it at first. She was just walking along, in time to that inner song: “Cosmos--cosmos--cosmos--cosmos--” And then she noticed she was walking with even, regular steps, stepping on every third crack in the board sidewalk, and that each of these cracks she stepped on ran, like a long punctuation, right through the middle of “cosmos.” So that she saw in her mind this picture: |Cos|mos| |cos|mos| |cos|mos| |cos|mos| It was fascinating, watching the third cracks punctuate her thoughts that way. Then it came to her that it was a childish sort of game--she was seventeen, now. So she avoided watching the cracks. But “Cosmos” went on singing through her head and soul. She came to Main Street and, ignoring the turn eastward which led to the Public Library, faced deliberately in the opposite direction. She was, in fact, bound for the office of the Beacon--the local weekly. And thoughts of what tremendous possibilities might be stretching out from this very hour, and of what she would say to Ed Martin, the editor, made her feet now skim along impatiently, and now slow down with sudden, self-conscious shyness. For Missy, even when there was no steadily nearing imminence of having to reveal her soul, on general principles was a little in awe of Ed Martin and his genial ironies. Ed Martin was not only a local celebrity. His articles were published in the big Eastern magazines. He went “back East” once a year, and it was said that on one occasion he had dined with the President himself. Of course that was only a rumour; but Cherryvale had its own eyes for witness that certain persons had stopped off in town expressly to see Ed Martin--personages whose names made you take notice! Missy, her feet terribly reluctant now, her soul's song barely a whisper, found Ed Martin shirt-sleeved in his littered little sanctum at the back of the Beacon office. “Why, hello, Missy!” he greeted, swinging round leisurely in his revolving-chair. Ed Martin was always so leisurely in his movements that the marvel was how he got so much accomplished. Local dignitaries of the most admired kind, perhaps, wear their distinction as a kind of toga; but Ed was plump and short, with his scant, fair hair always rumpled, and a manner as friendly as a child's. “Haven't got another Valedictory for us to print, have you?” he went on genially. Missy blushed. “I just dropped in for a minute,” she began uneasily. “I was just thinking--” She hesitated and paused. “Yes,” said Ed Martin encouragingly. “I was just thinking--that perhaps--” She clasped her hands tightly together and fixed her shining eyes on him in mute appeal. Then: