She fluttered down to a seat at the root of the great apple tree, making a pretty picture with the low boughs bending above her head. Valchester had already taken a seat and possessed himself of Jaquelina's worn poetry volume. He immediately became lost in its pages. Walter Earle groaned. "What has the book-worm got hold of now?" he inquired. Violet moved a little nearer--near enough to look over at the open volume. "Favorite poems by favorite authors," she replied. "Is that your daily reading?" asked Walter of Jaquelina. "Yes," she admitted. "Are you fond of poetry?" Violet asked her. "Yes," she said again, demurely. "You should ask Valchester to show you his volume of manuscript poetry," said Walter, laughing. "He is a very untiring and voluminous poet--I might say a second Byron!" Valchester looked up, flushed and confused--evidently annoyed. He was about to speak when Jaquelina broke out reproachfully: "Oh! Mr. Valchester--I asked you--and you denied it!" "Asked him what?" cried Walter, enjoying the situation immensely. "If he was a poet," said Jaquelina, breathless, "and he said----" "That no one ever accused me of it," said Valchester. "I confess to some rhymes, Miss Meredith, but to be a poet--a real poet--means more than that." "Miss Lina, it is only modesty that makes him talk so," said Walter, laughingly. "He has written some very readable rhymes, I assure you." "Miss Meredith, I hope you will not give credence to Walter's idle gossip," exclaimed Ronald Valchester, really distressed now. "It is as I told you just now, I have rhymed some--I confess it. Of course my verses sound well to Earle--he has not the slightest taste for poetry. True poetry and real doggerel would be alike to him. But the critics might tell me to----" "Return to your gallipots, as they told the poet-apothecary," laughed Earle. "Yes," said Valchester, and returned to his reading. "Read aloud to us," said Violet. "Should you not like that, Lina?" "Very much," she replied, and her dark eyes brightened at the thought. "Then I will read on from where we interrupted you," said Valchester, looking at Jaquelina. "Which poet was it, Miss Meredith?" "Longfellow--it was Hiawatha's Wooing," she said, and blushed, though she did not know why, at Violet's laugh. "And you left off--where?" inquired Valchester, holding the open book toward her. Jaquelina leaned forward a moment, turned a page with her brown forefinger, and showed him the verse. She did not know why her breath came quicker for an instant as his white hand touched hers quite accidentally, but Violet Earle saw the swift color rise into her cheek. It was a beautiful scene. The day was so bright and golden, the grass so green, the clover blossoms and the orchard blooms were so sweet, and the quartette under the apple tree were so young and so happy. Sorrow had never touched them with her gloomy finger. It was one of those "hours we frame in gold--pictures to be remembered."