Pleased and expectant, for Barbara began to surmise that she had not been brought to that lovely place by accident, she followed her guide in silence, and at last came out on a mound of grand circumference, covered so thickly with grass that her feet trod a hundred tiny flowers to death without her seeing them. The willows that margined the miniature lake at its base, and the hemlocks that crowded up from the forest, hedged in this pretty eminence, flickering its edges with tangled shadows and sunshine, but leaving a broad flat rock on the summit bathed in golden light. Around this rock, clusters of wild trumpet vines, trailing arbutus, and golden bitter-sweet, wove their beauties together in luxuriant wildness, creeping in rich traceries over the rock, or falling in garlands down the grassy sides of the mound. The centre of this rocky table was bright with sparkling crystals and clean as granite could be made. Something more than the hand of nature had been at work there. Not a dead leaf or broken twig could be found littering on the rock or in the grass.
"Ah, how lovely!" exclaimed the lady, flinging back the hood of her mantle, and looking around in pleasant astonishment. "Surely, Wahpee, this is not your work?"
"Would you be offended, lady, if it were mine?" said a voice close by, and from beneath the bending hemlocks came forth Philip, or Metacomet, the young man whose fate had been so strangely enwoven with her own.
"Nay, Philip, I am neither offended nor surprised. It was kind to provide me this lovely spot to rest in, and I am glad to look once more on the face of a friend."
Barbara sat down on the rock as she spoke, and unfastening the clasp of her scarlet cloak, allowed it to fall loosely around her. Philip flung himself on the grass at her feet, kindling up its green with the gorgeousness of his savage raiment. Seated thus, they could catch gleams of blue water under the willow branches, and watch the broad lily pods heaving softly up and down as if stirred with human pulses.
Barbara's face brightened, and her lips parted with smiles. She was naturally of a cheerful disposition, and such beauty as this gladdened her whole being.
"It seems like enchantment," she said; "some beautiful witchcraft has been at work here."
"It has brought a smile to that face, and I am happy," answered the young man.
"Have you known this spot long?" asked Barbara. "It looks like a corner in some English park. The clearing must have been made years ago, for, save that once massive stump, which is now more than half moss, no trace of the axe is visible."
"It was cleared years ago, lady, for I was born here."