Page:Daphne, an Autumn Pastoral.djvu/123

 wearing great gay-colored aprons in which they placed the olives as they gathered them from the trees. Ladders leaned against knotty tree trunks; baskets filled with the green fruit stood on the ground. Ladder and basket suggested the apple orchards of her native land, but the motley colors of kerchief and apron, yellow, magenta, turquoise, and green, and the gray of the eternal olive trees with the deep blue of the sky behind them, recalled her to the enchanted country where she was fast losing the landmarks of home.

"Signorina Daphne," said Bertuccio, speaking slowly as to a child, "did you ever hear them tell of the maiden on the hills up here who was carried away by a god?"

Daphne turned swiftly and tried to read his face. It was no less expressionless than usual.

"No," she answered. "Tell me. I am fond of stories."

They were climbing the winding road again,