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44
BEACHED KEELS

changing of the seasons, rather than the seasons themselves. But go you on, you two."

And so Archer found himself outdoors in the sunshine with the girl, talking and laughing, while her father, from the door, looked mournfully after them down the little flowering path.

Their escape led them southward along the curve of the hollow field, high above the shining water, and toward the steep ascent of the southern cliffs. The short, yellow-bleached grass of autumn was already dry and slippery underfoot, its tiny spears quivering in the warm breeze that had sprung up since the vanishing of the fog.

"I'm glad you came here," she said, looking up happily. Walking beside him, brown-faced, bareheaded, she had changed into a creature of the sunlight and sea air, a light-footed huntress of the island heights.

"There is our vegetable garden," she said, pointing to some green rows behind the house. "My father and I work there a great deal."—He laughed to hear the young huntress deliver such prosaic words.—"If you do