Page:Under three flags; a story of mystery (IA underthreeflagss00tayliala).pdf/10

 to the moonlight a face as troubled as the tossing river behind the dusky willows. As he releases her he extends his arm toward the ball of silver that is wheeling up the heavens. "See!" he cries. "The moon is up and it is a glorious night. Shall we follow that pathway of silver over the hills and far away?"

A loving look is her willing assent.

The witchery that the moon is said to exert o'er mortals must be more than a poet's myth. A strange peace has come upon the girl. Her senses are exalted. She seems to be walking on air. Nor does she now break upon the silence of her companion, whose agitation has been replaced by a singular calm.

What a stillness, yet what a busy world claims the woods they are crossing to-night! The crawling of a beetle through the dead leaves is distinctly heard, and a thousand small noises that the day never hears fill the forest with a strange music.

A short distance farther and the wanderers emerge into the open and pause to marvel at the picture spread before them.

It is a wondrous night. Bathed in a radiance that tips with silver every dew-laden spear of grass, the pasture slopes down to a highway, and the brawling of the brook beside it comes to their ears as a strain of music.

Silently the lovers take their way through this fairy-*land, clamber over the wall into the road, and continue on.

"I am cold," complains the girl, with a little shiver. Derrick wraps his light overcoat about her shoulders.

The striking of a town clock causes them both to start.

"Where are we?" asks the girl, looking about her in bewilderment. The moon passes behind a cloud. The spell is over.

"Why, this is Ashfield, isn't it? There is the station, and the church and the—Derrick! Derrick, where have we been wandering? Five miles from home and mid