Allan smiled sometimes to think how much pleasure he found in the society of these young people.  He usually carried a book or magazine, but as often as not it was unopened.

“I suppose the real Arden Foresters did not read books,” he remarked one day as, after glancing through the pages of a late novel, he tossed it disrespectfully into the empty lunch basket.

They had eaten their picnic dinner and were resting in easy attitudes on the grass,—­Miss Betty not being present to mention spines,—­in sight of their boats, swinging gently at anchor.

“Not any?” exclaimed Rosalind, to whom the idea of no books was a dreadful one.

“But they were in a story and were having lots of fun,” said Belle.

“And they found their books in brooks, didn’t they?” added Maurice.

“When you are having fun, you don’t read so much, that is true,” Rosalind said, burying her hands in the mass of clover blooms Katherine tossed into her lap.  “We’ll make a long, long chain, Katherine, and let it trail behind us as we go home.”

“Give me your experience,” said Allan, stretched at lazy length, with his arms under his head.  “Have you found that there is good in things invariably?”

“I like Mr. Allan because he talks to us as if we were grown up,” Belle whispered to Rosalind.

“There is more than you would think, till you try.”  Maurice answered.

“I think so.  Uncle Allan,” said Rosalind.  “I shouldn’t have had this good time and learned to know all of you, if father had not gone with Cousin Louis.  He said if I stayed in the Forest of Arden, I was sure to meet pleasant people, and I have.”  Rosalind looked at her companions with a soft light in her gray eyes.

“If it were not for you, we shouldn’t be having half so much fun,” said Belle, promptly.

“I think you would always have a good time, Belle,” answered Rosalind; “but I’m afraid if I hadn’t come to know all of you, I couldn’t have stayed in the Forest much longer, though the magician did cheer me up.”

“Then the idea is, that it is only when you stay in the Forest that you find the good in things?” said Allan.

“That was the way in the story.  Everything came right in the Forest,” Rosalind answered.

“I believe,” said Allan, “I should like to be an Arden Forester.”

This announcement was received with enthusiasm.

“That is, if I understand it.  ’To remember the Forest secret, to bear hard things bravely—­’”

“And if you are an honorary member, like Miss Celia and Morgan, you won’t have to search for the ring,” put in Belle.

“The ring is found, and is waiting till the magician breaks the spell.  You know, Uncle Allan, he has hung it on a nail in his shop, by the door, just as if he were trying really,” Rosalind explained.

“I think I shall ask to be taken on probation,” Mr. Whittredge continued.