“Of course it was very interesting to see the old chest unpacked,” said the Story Girl as she stirred the contents of a saucepan vigorously.  “But now that it is over I believe I am sorry that it is opened.  It isn’t mysterious any longer.  We know all about it now, and we can never imagine what things are in it any more.”

“It’s better to know than to imagine,” said Felicity.

“Oh, no, it isn’t,” said the Story Girl quickly.  “When you know things you have to go by facts.  But when you just dream about things there’s nothing to hold you down.”

“You’re letting the taffy scorch, and THAT’S a fact you’d better go by,” said Felicity sniffing.  “Haven’t you got a nose?”

When we went to bed, that wonderful white enchantress, the moon, was making an elf-land of the snow-misted world outside.  From where I lay I could see the sharp tops of the spruces against the silvery sky.  The frost was abroad, and the winds were still and the land lay in glamour.

Across the hall, the Story Girl was telling Felicity and Cecily the old, old tale of Argive Helen and “evil-hearted Paris.”

“But that’s a bad story,” said Felicity when the tale was ended.  “She left her husband and run away with another man.”

“I suppose it was bad four thousand years ago,” admitted the Story Girl.  “But by this time the bad must have all gone out of it.  It’s only the good that could last so long.”

Our summer was over.  It had been a beautiful one.  We had known the sweetness of common joys, the delight of dawns, the dream and glamour of noontides, the long, purple peace of carefree nights.  We had had the pleasure of bird song, of silver rain on greening fields, of storm among the trees, of blossoming meadows, and of the converse of whispering leaves.  We had had brotherhood with wind and star, with books and tales, and hearth fires of autumn.  Ours had been the little, loving tasks of every day, blithe companionship, shared thoughts, and adventuring.  Rich were we in the memory of those opulent months that had gone from us—­richer than we then knew or suspected.  And before us was the dream of spring.  It is always safe to dream of spring.  For it is sure to come; and if it be not just as we have pictured it, it will be infinitely sweeter.

THE END.