"All right," he answered. "Come on and walk down to the gate with me, and we'll stop at the measuring-tree. We can't let the old custom go by when we've kept it up so many years, and I won't be back again this vacation."
Swinging the letter back and forth to make sure that the ink was dry, she walked along beside him. "Oh, I wish you weren't going away!" she exclaimed, forlornly. "It's going to be dreadfully stupid the rest of the summah."
They reached the measuring-tree, and taking out his knife and pocket-rule, Rob passed his fingers over the notches which stood for the many years they had measured their heights against the old locust. Then he held out the rule and waited for her to take her place under it, with her back against the tree.
"What a long way you've stretched up between six and seventeen," he said. "This'll be about the last time we'll need to go through this ceremony, for I've reached my top notch, and probably you have too."
"Wait!" she exclaimed, stooping to pick something out of the grass at her feet. "Heah's anothah foah-leaved clovah. I find one neahly every time I come down this side of the avenue. I'm making a collection of them. When I get enough, maybe I'll make a photograph-frame of them."
"Then you ought to put your own picture in it, for you're certainly the luckiest person for finding them I ever heard of. I'm going to carve one on the tree, here by this last notch under the date. It will be quite neat and symbolical, don't you think? A sort of 'when this you see remember me' hieroglyphic. It will remind you of the long discussions we've had on the subject since we read 'Abdallah' together."
He dug away in silence for a moment, then said, "It's queer how you happened to find that just now, for last night I came across a verse about one, that made me think of you, and I learned it on purpose to say to you—sort of a farewell wish, you know."
"Spouting poetry is a new accomplishment for you, Bobby," said Lloyd, teasingly. "I certainly want to hear it. Go on."
She looked down to thrust the stem of the clover through the silver arrow that fastened her belt, and waited with an expectant smile to hear what Limerick or nonsense jingle he had found that made him think of her. It was neither. With eyes fixed on the little symbol he was outlining on the bark of the tree, he recited as if he were reading the words from it:
| "Love, be true to her; |
| Life, be dear to her; |
| Health, stay close to her; |
| Joy, draw near to her; |
| Fortune, find what your gifts |
| Can do for her. |
| Search your treasure-house |
| Through and through for her. |
| Follow her steps |
| The wide world over; |
| You must! for here is |
| The four-leaved clover." |