"Never fear. I'll protect mine," she boasted.

On the morrow they turned their faces toward home and the Professor.


XI

"It looks very out-of-the-worldly, doesn't it?" Bambi said as they came in sight of home.

"It looks like Paradise to me," sighed Jarvis, holding open the gate for her.

"Enter Eve, dragging the serpent," she laughed as she passed in. "Eve never played in an arithmetical garden," she added. "If she had, there would probably have been no immortal fall."

"The number eights look tired," Jarvis commented, ignoring her witticism.

She spied the Professor afar sitting at work on the piazza. She flew along the path and burst in upon him.

"Daddy!" she cried, and enveloped him. His astonishment was poignant.