It had always seemed as rational an assumption that their futures should merge as that the only pair of falcons in a forest full of jack-daws should mate. Now he spoke of friendships! Yet the girl, though stunned with bitter disappointment, was not wholly astonished. Topics of gossip are rare enough to be made much of in the hills, and the neighbours had not failed to intimate in her hearing that when she was away her "beau" had been sitting devotedly at other feet; but Happy had smiled tranquilly upon her informants. "Boone would be right apt to be charitable to a stranger," she had said, giving them none of the satisfaction of seeing the thorn rankle, which is not to say that she did not feel the sting. She had found false security in the thought that Boone, even if he felt Anne's allurement, would be too sensible to raise his eyes to her as a possibility since their worlds were not only different but veritable antipodes of circumstance. What she had failed to consider was that the Romeos and Juliets of the world have never taken thought of what the houses of Montague and Capulet might say. For a while now she sat very silent, her hands in her lap tightly clasped and unmoving, but when she spoke her voice was even and soft. "Thank you, Boone," she said; then after a moment, "Boone, is there anything you'd like to tell me?" The young man looked suddenly up at her, and his reply was a question, too--an awkward and startled one: "What about, Happy--what do you mean?" "The best thing friends can do--is to listen to what interests--each other. Sometimes there are things we keep right silent about--in general, I mean--and yet we get lonesome--for somebody to talk to--about those things." There was a pause, and then as Happy explained, the seeming serenity of her manner was a supreme test of self-effacement which deserved an accolade for bravery. "I'd heard it hinted--that you thought a heap of a girl--down below--I thought maybe you'd like to tell me about her." How should he know that words so simply spoken in the timbre of calm naturalness came from a heart that was agonized? How could he guess that the quiet figure sitting in the low chair was suffering inexpressible pain, or that the eyes that looked out through half-closed lids seemed to see a world of rocking hills, black under clouds of an unrelieved hopelessness? One who has come braced for an ordeal and finds that he has reared for himself a fictitious trouble, can realize in the moment of reaction only the vast elation of relief. Had her acting been less perfect, he might have caught a shadowing forth of the truth--but, as it was, he only felt that shackles had been knocked from him, and that he stood a free man.