overnight. Returning, I found her seated on the turf, her chin in her hand and her dark eyes watching the distant play of lightning. Master Sparrow had left his post, and was nowhere to be seen.

I gave her my hand and led her to the shore; then loosed my boat and helped her aboard. I was pushing off when a voice hailed us from the bank, and the next instant a great bunch of red roses whirled past me and fell into her lap. “Sweets to the sweet, you know,” said Master Jeremy Sparrow genially. “Goodwife Allen will never miss them.”

I was in two minds whether to laugh or to swear, — for I had never given her flowers, — when she settled the question for me by raising the crimson mass and bestowing it upon the flood.