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Sally Myers was a pretty little girl of twelve, open
and ingenuous in manner, and with the brightest eyes
and cheeks in the world. She and Barry seemed to be
on excellent terms, laughing and talking about a thousand
things. He carried in his left hand her sachel,
which was empty and destined to receive such flowers
as the autumn days, now fairly come, had spared to the
green banks of the run. His right hand held one of the
child's, which he swung backward and forward as if it
was all for fun—a mere unconscious, mechanical act—
which it was not.

The child looking round saw her father; the old hunter
stretched out his arms—Barry felt the small hand suddenly
jerked away, and she was in those stalwart arms,
on that broad breast.

Max touched Barry and said laughing:

“Pretty sight isn't it, Barry?”

Barry blushed, and smiled.

“Why, how well she looks,” said the hunter admiringly,
“cheeks like the roses, and she's really getting fat
here in town! Did any body ever!”

The child laughed.

“I am so, father!” she said; “and I don't know what
I'll look like in the play with Mr. Max—besides being so
scared!”

“What is it, darling?”

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“It's Juliet I'm to play, sir. I most know it now, and
Mr. Max showed me, yesterday, how to kill myself.”

“Anan?” said the hunter.

“I'm to kill myself, you know, father—in the piece.”

“She's to make out she kills herself, sir,” said Max,
laughing.

“Yes, sir,” said the child; “I have done it two or three
times now, and I know all my words.”

The old hunter shook his head.

“It's mighty strange to me, this playing like you were
in earnest: but I know it's all right, because Jacob Von
Horn says it is. Besides, I'll be there little one, to see
you killin' yourself,” added the old man, laughing.

Then stooping down, he kissed his little daughter again—
the small bright face against the old weather-beaten
brows so long lashed by stormy winds—the tender arms
tightly clasped around those brawny shoulders which had
borne the weight of that past discoursed of; that past
more stormy than the stormiest wind! Here for the
thoughtful eye was truly the young, bright present, full
of peace and joy, clasping the rugged strength—hardened
in many stern encounters—of the former time.

“The old man is ill without you, little one, up there in
his valley,” said the mountaineer. “I must come and see
you oftener. Now I must go, daughter, to see to my business.
I'll be at the school, though, this evening.”

“Come to our house, and we'll send Barry for her, sir;
or if Barry won't go,” said Max, laughing, “I'll go myself
for Miss Juliet.”

The old man assented to this, and left them, his gun
under his arm.

“Well, Juliet, we must have a rehearsal,” said the
young man; “get your part well by this evening. Have
you your white dress?”

“Oh yes, Mr. Max!” said the child.

“And that reminds me that I must leave you, Juliet,

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though your beauty makes this street a `feasting presence
full of light.' I must go and see my friend, Mrs. Courtlandt,
about my dress.”

“Oh, ain't you afraid, Mr. Max?”

“Afraid!—why?”

“She's such a dreadful person the girls say, you know.”

“Do the girls say that?”

“Yes, sir,” said the child, “don't they, Barry? I
wouldn't dare to look at her!”

“She is dreadful,” said Max, “a regular old ogress: but
she's my aunt, Sally: I must not abuse her.”

And Max leaving the children to finish their stroll in
the direction of Tuscarora brook, took his way toward the
abode of the ogress, Mrs. Courtlandt.

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