As the girl played,--her winsome face upturned to the mountain heights and her body, lightly poised, swaying with the movement of her arm as easily as a willow bough,--she appeared, to the man hidden in the cedars, as some beautiful spirit of the woods and hills--a spirit that would vanish instantly if he should step from his hiding place. He was so close that he could see her blue eyes, wide and unmindful of her surroundings; her lips, curved in an unconscious smile; and her cheeks, flushed with emotion under their warm brown tint--as she appeared to listen for the music that she, in turn,--seemingly with no effort of her will,--gave forth again in the tones of the instrument under her chin. Aaron King was moved by the beauty of the picture as he had never been stirred before. The peculiar charm of the music; the loveliness of the girl herself; the setting of the scene in the little glade with its wild roses, giant sycamores, dark cedars, and encircling mountain walls, all in the soft mystery of the twilight's beginning; and, withal, the unexpectedness of the vision--combined to make an impression upon the artist's mind that would endure for many years. Suddenly, as he watched, the music ceased. The girl lowered her violin, and, with a low laugh, said to some one on the porch--concealed from the painter by the trunk of a sycamore--"O Myra, I want to dance. I can't keep still. I'm so glad, glad to be home again--to see old 'San Berdo' and 'Gray Back' and all the rest of them up there!" She stretched out her arms as if in answer to a welcome from the hills. Then, whirling quickly, she gave the violin to her companion on the porch. "Play, Myra; please, dear, play." At her word, the music of the violin began again--coming now, from behind the trunk of the sycamore. In the hands of the unseen musician, the instrument laughed and sang a song of joyous abandonment--of freedom and rejoicing--of happiness and love--while in perfect harmony with the spirit and the rhythm of the melody, the girl danced upon the firm, green carpet of grass. Here and there, to and fro, about the little glade shut in from the world by its walls of living green, she tripped and whirled in unstudied grace--lightly as if winged--unconscious as the wild creatures that play in the depths of the woods--wayward as the zephyr that trips along the mountainside. It was a spontaneous expression of her spiritual and physical exaltation and was as natural as the laughter in her voice or the flush upon her cheeks. It was a dance that was like no dance that Aaron King had ever seen.