"Not by a good deal!" he answered, "Thee is not to know the real secret until we have had our dinner. I will build the fire and clean the fish, and if thee knows how, thee can cook them." "Oh, you need not think I don't know anything--just because I cannot skip stones and bait hooks," Pepeeta said gaily, and with that they both bustled about and before long the smoke was curling up into the still air, and the fragrant odor of coffee was perfuming the wilderness. While they were waiting for the fish to fry, Pepeeta regaled her enchanted listener with such fragments of the story of her gypsy life as she could piece together out of the wrecks of that time. He was overpowered with astonishment, and the idea that he was sitting opposite to a real gypsy, at the mouth of a cave, filled up the measure of his romantic fancy and perfected his happiness. He hung upon her words and kept her talking until the last crust had been devoured and she had repeated again and again the most trivial remembrances of those far off days. The boy's bliss had reached its utmost limit, and yet had not surpassed the woman's. The vigorous walk through the woods; the silent ministrations of nature; the simple food; the sweet imaginative associations with David; but above all that most recreative force in nature,--the presence and prattle of a child,--filled her sad heart with a happiness of which she had believed herself forever incapable. They sat for a few moments in silence, after Pepeeta had finished one of her most charming reminiscences, and then Steven, springing to his feet, exclaimed: "Why, Pepeeta, we have forgotten the secret! Come and I will show it to thee." She took his proffered hand and was led into the depths of the cavern. "Thee must shut thy eyes," he said. "Oh! but I am so frightened," she answered, pretending to shudder and draw back. "Thee need not be afraid. I will protect thee," he said, reassuringly. She obeyed him, and they moved forward. "Are thy eyes shut tight? How many fingers do I hold up?" he asked, raising his hand. "Six," she answered. "All right; there were only two," he said, convinced and satisfied. He led her along a dozen steps or so, and then halted. "Turn this way," swinging her about; "do not open thy eyes till I tell thee. There--now!" For an instant the darkness seemed impenetrable; but there was enough of a faint light, rather like pale belated moonbeams than the brightness of the sun, to enable her to read her own name carved upon the smooth wall of rock. "Ah! little deceiver, when did you do this?" she asked, touched by his gallantry. "Do this! Why, Pepeeta, I did not do it," he answered, surprised and taken back by her misunderstanding. "You did not do it?" she asked, astonished in her turn. "Who did it if you did not?" "Why--can't thee guess?" he asked.