Page:The New Arcadia (Tucker).djvu/309

Rh feelingly the girl had read to her the tragic story of Elaine.

"I cannot help it," the fanciful old lady continued, "but, now that I know all, I am ever, in my dreams, associating Gwyneth with Elaine, and seeing the child herself reclining in the barge in which the Lily-maid voyaged to Camelot."

On a bank below the old people, the young folk, Eva and Maud, Travers, Frank, and Tom, were sitting, close to the rivulet brink. The girls were plaiting wreaths of wattle and clematis. Travers was bravely battling with his despondency. Seizing the garland Maud had woven, he had bent forward and laughingly placed it on Eva's brow, exclaiming—

"So I crown you Queen of the Vale."

Instinctively he thought of the one who was still the queen of his heart. He raised his eyes to look across the lake to the vine-clad hill beyond, where, it was said, its guardian angel spent her days.

He started to his feet.

Mrs. Dowling, above, who had just concluded her remark about the Lily-maid, uttered a startled cry. All stood as if spell-bound.

Upon the lake, a few hundred yards away, a boat with white sail was bearing down upon the very spot where they stood. The tiny vessel seemed filled with flowers. Amongst them lay a frail form, clad in white, a lily in her hand. Her eyes were closed, a smile played upon the wasted, ethereal face, about which lay a profusion of golden hair.

No one moved. Not a sound was uttered. Like a fairy vision, the little vessel glided onward towards the picnickers. It brushed along the bank on which the fresh-crowned Queen of the Lake was sitting. The sail,