Kilmeny of the Orchard

them get away from me. I must play to you again. You look too sober.”

She laughed again, picked up her violin, and played a tinkling, roguish little mel- ody as if she were trying to tease him, looking at Eric over her violin with lumi- nous eyes that dared him to be merry.

Eric smiled; but the puzzled look re- turned to his face many times that eve- ning. He walked home in a brown study. Kilmeny’s case certainly seemed a strange one, and the more he thought of it the stranger it seemed.

“ It strikes me as something very pe— culiar that she should be able to make sounds only when she is not thinking about it,” he reflected. “I wish David Baker could examine her. But I suppose that is out of the question. That grim pair who have charge of her would never consent.”

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