"Oh, if you like birds you are going to enjoy the Mill Farm. We have a very respectable choir in these woods. Now we could keep on in this path past the mill, 'way out to the end of the peninsula, but we don't this time; instead we turn right here and then"--the speaker waved his hand up a gentle incline, at the head of which stood an oblong white house with green blinds; "that's the Mill Farm." "Judge Trent's farm." Sylvia's eyes met those of her host. "Why did you deceive me?" she repeated, gazing at him while they stood still in the soft grass. Thinkright brought the knuckles of one of his hands into the hard palm of the other. "I asked you to come to the farm, didn't I? You were not thinking kindly of Judge Trent then; you were wasting your time thinking wrong about his wrong doings. If I'd said come and be your uncle's guest at the Mill Farm instead of at the Young Woman's Christian Association, you'd have questioned and doubted some time probably, and we might not have caught that evening train to Portland, and it was best for me to get home." Sylvia bit her lip. "Now there isn't one thing to do but think right," went on her host kindly, "and you'll be happy as a girl should be. You believe there's satisfaction in slapping back, and it galls you because you can't. It's the greatest mistake you can imagine. The satisfaction of slapping back only leads on to greater complications and final disaster in a logical sequence. Now, I'm not penniless, my little cousin. Just at present you're my guest." "Oh, am I really, Cousin Thinkright?" cried the girl eagerly. "Surely you are." "Then I can begin to have a good time right off," she exclaimed, her white cheeks flushing as she took his arm in her relief. He smiled as they walked slowly up the incline. "Always have a good time," he said. "The daughter of a great King should hide her head in shame if she admits any other thought." CHAPTER VIII IN HARBOR As Cap'n Lem's team drew deliberately up the hill to the house, his daughter-in-law and grandchild came out on the doorstep. "Hello, Lucil; hello, Minty," he cried. Twelve-year-old Araminta, dressed in a red plaid frock, long of legs and arms, round of eyes, and with her braid beribboned in pink in honor of the unknown, looked her disappointment. "They never come!" she exclaimed. "We might jest as well as not rode to town, ma." "Well, we couldn't 'a' known it, and no use cryin' over spilt milk," returned her mother. Mrs. Lemuel Foster had raised her pompadour exceptionally high this morning, and the knot at the back of her head had the psyche-like protuberance reserved for state occasions. "Whoa, Jim. Hi thar, Pete," said Cap'n Lem, for his steeds began to exhibit spirit at the proximity of the barn. "Oh, yes, they come all right." "Then who is it?" cried the two on the doorstep, in perfect unison. Thinkright's message had not specified the nature of his guest. "The missin' link," replied Cap'n Lem. "Haw, haw, haw!"