rocks, and many a time he would have given up the struggle had not the thought of sweet Alin’s loving eyes brought him the strength and desire to struggle as long as it was possible.  Long, long, long, to him seemed that bitter and perilous passage; but at last he won through to the furthest side.  Breathless and reeling, his vesture torn, his great wounds bleeding, he found himself on the shore where the fountain of immortality sprang up.  He staggered to its brink and drank of its clear stream.  Then all pain and weariness fell away from him, and he rose up, a god, beautiful with immortality.  And as he did there came rushing over the Rainbow Bridge a great company—­the band of fellow travellers.  But all were too late to win the double boon.  Ving had won to it through the danger and suffering of the dark river.”

The rainbow had faded out, and the darkness of the October dusk was falling.

“I wonder,” said Dan meditatively, as we went away from that redolent spot, “what it would be like to live for ever in this world.”

“I expect we’d get tired of it after awhile,” said the Story Girl.  “But,” she added, “I think it would be a goodly while before I would.”

CHAPTER XXIX.  THE SHADOW FEARED OF MAN

We were all up early the next morning, dressing by candlelight.  But early as it was we found the Story Girl in the kitchen when we went down, sitting on Rachel Ward’s blue chest and looking important.

“What do you think?” she exclaimed.  “Peter has the measles!  He was dreadfully sick all night, and Uncle Roger had to go for the doctor.  He was quite light-headed, and didn’t know any one.  Of course he’s far too sick to be taken home, so his mother has come up to wait on him, and I’m to live over here until he is better.”

This was mingled bitter and sweet.  We were sorry to hear that Peter had the measles; but it would be jolly to have the Story Girl living with us all the time.  What orgies of story telling we should have!

“I suppose we’ll all have the measles now,” grumbled Felicity.  “And October is such an inconvenient time for measles—­there’s so much to do.”

“I don’t believe any time is very convenient to have the measles,” Cecily said.

“Oh, perhaps we won’t have them,” said the Story Girl cheerfully.  “Peter caught them at Markdale, the last time he was home, his mother says.”

“I don’t want to catch the measles from Peter,” said Felicity decidedly.  “Fancy catching them from a hired boy!”

“Oh, Felicity, don’t call Peter a hired boy when he’s sick,” protested Cecily.

During the next two days we were very busy—­too busy to tell tales or listen to them.  Only in the frosty dusk did we have time to wander afar in realms of gold with the Story Girl.  She had recently been digging into a couple of old volumes of classic myths and northland folklore which she had found in Aunt Olivia’s attic; and for us, god and goddess, laughing nymph and mocking satyr, norn and valkyrie, elf and troll, and “green folk” generally, were real creatures once again, inhabiting the orchards and woods and meadows around us, until it seemed as if the Golden Age had returned to earth.