It happened that the Story Girl and I both got up very early on the morning of the Awkward Man’s wedding day. Uncle Alec was going to Charlottetown that day, and I, at daybreak by the sounds in the kitchen beneath us, remembered that I had forgotten to ask him to bring me a certain school-book I wanted. So I hurriedly dressed and hastened down to tell him before he went. I was joined on the stairs by the Story Girl, who said she had wakened and, not feeling like going to sleep again, thought she might as well get up.  
“I had such a funny dream last night,” she said. “I dreamed that I heard a voice calling me from away down in Uncle Stephen’s Walk—‘Sara, Sara, Sara,’ it kept calling. I didn’t know whose it was, and yet it seemed like a voice I knew. I wakened up while it was calling, and it seemed so real I could hardly believe it was a dream. It was bright moonlight, and I felt just like getting up and going out to the . But I knew that would be silly and of course I didn’t go. But I kept on wanting to and I couldn’t sleep any more. Wasn’t it queer?”
 
When Uncle Alec had gone I proposed a saunter to the farther end of the orchard, where I had left a book the preceding evening. A young mom was walking on the hills as we passed down Uncle Stephen’s Walk, with Paddy before us. High overhead was the spirit-like blue of paling skies; the east was a great arc of crystal, through with crimsonings; just above it was one milk-white star of morning, like a pearl on a silver sea. A light wind of dawn was weaving an orient spell.
 
“It’s lovely to be up as early as this, isn’t it?” said the Story Girl. “The world seems so different just at sunrise, doesn’t it? It makes me feel just like getting up to see the sun rise every morning of my life after this. But I know I won’t. I’ll likely sleep later than ever tomorrow morning. But I wish I could.”
 
“The Awkward Man and Miss Reade are going to have a lovely day for their wedding,” I said.
 
“Yes, and I’m so glad. Beautiful Alice deserves everything good. Why, Bev—why, Bev! Who is that in the hammock?”
 
I looked. The hammock was swung under the two end trees of the Walk. In it a man was lying, asleep, his head pillowed on his overcoat. He was sleeping easily, lightly, and . He had a brown beard and thick brown hair. His cheeks were a dusky red and the of his closed eyes were as long and dark and silken as a girl’s. He wore a light gray suit, and on the slender white hand that hung down over the hammock’s edge was a spark of diamond fire.
 
It seemed to me that I knew his face, although assuredly I had never seen him before. While I groped among vague the Story Girl gave a queer, choked little cry. The next moment she had sprung over the intervening space, dropped on her knees by the hammock, and flung her arms about the man’s neck.
 
“Father! Father!” she cried, while I stood, rooted to the ground in my .
 
The stirred and opened two large, exceedingly brilliant hazel eyes. For a moment he gazed rather blankly at the brown-curled young lady who was embracing him. Then a most smile broke over his face; he sprang up and caught her to his heart.
 
“Sara—Sara—my little Sara! To think didn’t know you at first glance! But you are almost a woman. And when I saw you last you were just a little girl of eight. My own little Sara!”
 
“Father—father—sometimes I’ve wondered if you were ever coming back to me,” I heard the Story Girl say, as I turned and up the Walk, realizing that I was not wanted there just then and would be little missed. Various emotions and speculations my mind in my retreat; but chiefly did I feel a sense of triumph in being the bearer of exciting news.
 
“Aunt Janet, Uncle Blair is here,” I announced breathlessly at the kitchen door.
 
Aunt Janet, who was kneading her bread, turned round and lifted floury hands. Felicity and Cecily, who were just entering the kitchen, from , stopped still and stared at me.
 
“Uncle who?” exclaimed Aunt Janet.
 
“Uncle Blair—the Story Girl’s father, you know. He’s here.”
 
“WHERE?”
 
“Down in the orchard. He was asleep in the hammock. We found him there.”
 
“Dear me!” said Aunt Janet, sitting down helplessly. “If that isn’t like Blair! Of course he couldn’t come like anybody else. I wonder,” she added in a tone unheard by anyone else save myself, “I wonder if he has come to take the child away.”
 
My went out like a snuffed candle. I had never thought of this. If Uncle Blair took the Story Girl away would not life become rather savourless on the hill farm? I turned and followed Felicity and Cecily out in a very mood.
 
Uncle Blair and the Story Girl were just coming out of the orchard. His arm was about her and hers was on his shoulder. Laughter and tears were contending in her eyes. Only once before—when Peter had come back from the Valley of the Shadow—had I seen the Story Girl cry. Emotion had to go very deep with her ere it touched the source of tears. I had always known that she loved her father , though she rarely talked of him, understanding that her uncles and aunts were not whole-heartedly his friends.
 
But Aunt Janet’s welcome was cordial enough, though a trifle . Whatever , hard-working farmer folk might think of gay, Bohemian Blair Stanley in his absence, in his presence even they liked him, by the grace of some , lovable quality in the soul of him. He had “a way with him”—revealed even in the manner with which he caught staid Aunt Janet in his arms, swung her matronly form around as though she had been a slim schoolgirl, and kissed her rosy cheek.
 
“Sister o’ mine, are you never going to grow old?” he said. “Here you are at forty-five with the roses of sixteen—and not a gray hair, I’ll .”
 
“Blair, Blair, it is you who are always young,” laughed Aunt Janet, not ill pleased. “Where in the world did you come from? And what is this I hear of your sleeping all night in the hammock?”
 
“I’ve been painting in the Lake District all summer, as you know,” answered Uncle Blair, “and one day I just got homesick to see my little girl. So I sailed for Montreal without further delay. I got here at eleven last night—the station-master’s son drove me down. Nice boy. The old house was in darkness and I thought it would be a shame to rouse you all out of bed after a hard day’s work. So I that I would spend the night in the orchard. It was moonlight, you know, and moonlight in an old orchard is one of the few things left over from the Golden Age.”
 
“It was very foolish of you,” said practical Aunt Janet. “These September nights are real . You might have caught your death of cold—or a bad dose of .”
 
“So I might. No doubt it was foolish of me,” agreed Uncle Blair . “It must have been the fault, of the moonlight. Moonlight, you know, Sister Janet, has an quality. It is a fine, airy, silver wine, such as fairies............