The high grass, tasseled and rank, glimmered with dew. The moonlit spaces wore a finer and a fairer lustre for the deep romantic shadows that hung about the boughs. There were long and glittering arches, where the fruited branches interlaced, and in the dappling shade beneath, the boles, all at regular intervals, had a columnated effect; and these arboreal aisles seemed endless. Even the homelier incidents of the orchard shared the enchantment of the moonlight: some blight that had fallen on one of the goodly branches had bereft it of leaves and fruit, and a web that had been woven about it shone, a refulgent gauze, and radiated a delicate and fibrous splendor. Down these simple ways Marcella went, the light upon her face; her hair fluttered with the slight breeze; her step was sure and free; she seemed so ethereal that she too might have been some embellishing fantasy of the night. The bird of ill-omen had ceased to cry, as if her very presence exorcised all evil fortunes. She paused, gazing upward, the moonbeams full on her shining eyes. She had lifted one arm and laid hold of a fruit-freighted bough. It seemed strange that she did not see the owl, so well she realized how it must look, up among the boughs somewhere, demurely silent, shuffling down, and suppressing, as it were, its fearful identity among its mottled feathers, its head askew as it watched her with its big yellow eyes. She had her hand upon the retributive apple; a sudden footfall,—Teck Jepson was approaching along the dewy colonnade. The owl was safe, very safe indeed: a pity that the “fow-_el_” might not have known this, and have spared itself the anguish of fright that it endured, as it sat almost within arm’s length, discreetly silent, refraining from stirring claw or feather, and wisely looking down upon them. The bough was shaking with more than the wind, for Marcella’s hand trembled on the unplucked apple. Jepson’s hat was thrust on the back of his head. His face, too, was distinctly visible as he approached. Somehow he had never seemed to her so tall, so imperious of temper, so impressive, as now. But there was a trifle of embarrassment in his manner, and he only said,— “Whar’s that thar ow-_el_?” “I dunno,” faltered Marcella. He did not seem to care. His mind was evidently little concerned with the “fow-_el_.” He paused, looking steadily at her, as if he expected her to speak again. But she still stood silent, the moonlight in her lustrous eyes and on her upturned face, her hand on the apple as it swung on the low bough. “I never expected ter hear ez ye hed been talkin’ ’bout me that-a-way; I never looked fur it,” he said.