While the pretty girl was singing, Earle Winans came up silently and stood by the tree, looking down at Ladybird with the apple-blossom wreath on her shining hair.
Ladybird's arch, pretty face had grown pensive while she listened to the song, and her tiny white hand, with its babyish dimples, played absently with a branch of pink crab-apple blooms that lay in her lap. She was more lovely than any picture ever painted, and Earle's heart swelled with a passionate longing to catch the exquisite young creature in his arms and press all that budding beauty against his ardent breast.
Ladybird knew that he was there, but she would not turn her head; and when the song came to an end she sighed and murmured softly:
"I wonder what this love is like of which poets sing, and lovers rave, and spring-birds warble. It must be very sweet."
"My darling, let me teach you all its sweetness," murmured Earle's voice in her ear, but though a swift blush burned her face, she shrugged her willful shoulders, and continued in a louder voice, that all around might hear:
"If I ever do fall in love, it will be with a hero, with some man who has done something great, or perhaps risked his life to save mine. I don't believe I could ever love a common, everyday sort of man, like the ones I know, unless he turned out to be a hero. Then I could worship him!"
And just a few hours later those words, spoken in such artless innocence, came back to the heart of every man there—came back with a thrill of love and hope.
She had stolen away from them all a short time before, and just as they were wondering what had become of the little sprite, they heard some one singing blithely on the river.
It was Ladybird in a little blue boat, rowing herself with consummate skill, the water falling in silvery sparkles from the light oars. Her pretty face glowed rosily, and her eyes danced with fun as she trilled a gay little boating song. It was the bonniest sight ever seen on the broad, beautiful river flowing between its banks of spring-time green.
Every one ran down to the bank—every one but Aura Stanley, who sulked beneath a tree.