FRANKNESS AND GARDENING 225 



thing to save up for, when the rose bed is completed 

 take note of that ! 



When Bart came home this afternoon, he walked 

 through the rooms before going out and commented 

 on the different flowers, entirely simple in arrangement, 

 and lingered over them, touching and taking pleasure 

 in them in a way wholly different from last week, 

 when each room was a jungle and I was fairly suffering 

 from flower surfeit. 



Now I find myself taking note of happy combinations 

 of colour in other people's gardens and along the high- 

 ways for further experiments. I seem to remember 

 looking over a list of flower combinations and sugges- 

 tions in your garden book. Will you lend it to me? 



By the way, opal effects seem to circle about the place 

 this season the sunsets, the farm-house windows, and 

 finally that rainy night when we were playing whist, 

 when The Man, taking a pencil from his pocket, pulled 

 out a little chamois bag that, being loose at one end, 

 shed a shower of the unset stones upon the green cloth, 

 where they lay winking and blinking like so many fiery 

 coals. 



"Are you a travelling jeweler's shop?" quizzed Bart. 



"No," replied The Man, watching the stones where 

 they lay, but not attempting to pick them up; "the 



