THEIR FORTUNATE ESCAPE 97 



black gowns and straight white collars that she always 

 wore, as a sort of professional garb, have vanished 

 before a shirtwaist with an openwork neck and half 

 sleeves, while the flesh exposed thereby is pink and 

 wholesome. Hair not secured for the wear and tear 

 of the daily rounds of school, but allowed to air itself, 

 requires only a few hair-pins, and, if it is naturally wavy, 

 follows its own will with good effect. While as to her 

 eyes, what in them seemed piercing at short range melted 

 to an engaging frankness in the soft light under the trees. 

 In short, if she had been any other than Maria Maxwell, 

 music teacher, Bart's staid cousin and the avowed 

 family spinster, I should have thought of her as a fine- 

 looking woman who only needed a magic touch of 

 some sort to become positively handsome. Coffee and 

 paper finished, I became aware that Bart was gazing 

 at me. 



"Well," I said, extending my hand, "what next?" 

 I had speedily made up my mind that Bart should 

 take the initiative in our camping-out arrangement, 

 and I therefore did not suggest that the first thing to be 

 done was to set our camp itself in order. 



" Come out," he said, taking my hand in the same way 

 that the Infant does when she wishes to lead the way to 

 the discovery of the fairyland that lies beyond the mead- 



