His arms closed her to him. This time her face rose to his, the long, silky lashes drooping under those divinely arched brows. His lips found the warm, velvety caress of hers. He felt her tremble like a prisoned bird in his arms.
There came to them the sound of footfalls and a rasping of steel boot-hobs on the rock up the trail. The girl pressed him from her, wide, genuine alarm in her eyes. “You must go—quickly,” she urged.
“Then until we meet again—Josephine—good-bye,” he whispered.
“Good-bye—Louis.”
He flung off along the lakeshore trail. But at a sound he stopped in the screen of evergreens.
The low-hanging branches of the balsams parted at the mouth of the other trail and a great figure of a man, immaculate, faultless in his tartan mackinaw, corduroy riding breeches and knee-high white elk bush boots, stepped out upon the sands of the beach.
The newcomer doffed his soft narrow-brimmed stetson hat with the grace and courtliness of a knight of old. Acey Smith!
The deviltry that invariably lurked about the lumber-man’s pale, handsome face was masked in the blandest of smiles.
“Good-morning, Miss Stone.” His greeting had a low, rich quality of music in it that bespoke the cultured gentleman Hammond conceived him not to be. The magical effect of his presence on the young woman gave Hammond his first poignant twinge of jealousy.
“I hope I did not keep you waiting long,” she offered, going forward to meet him. “I was away for a long walk this morning.”