ably hurt. His days were entirely divided between the Countess and his study in the barn. With the first of these preoccupations the town was ringing, and it was only by virtue of that curious local code which prevented Mrs. Baker from learning of her husband's Chicago escapades that the scandal of Gareth's adventures was kept from the ears of his father and mother. As for the second, his collections no longer served to interest him, but he found his study a most desirable spot in which to indulge in sympathetic revery.
Gareth and the Countess spent part of every day together; sometimes the whole day; sometimes a portion of the evening. They went on long walks; they went bicycling; they went driving. They explored the surrounding country in every direction within a radius of twenty miles. To the boy these golden hours atoned for all the dulness and involuntary banality of his past. He was beginning, indeed, to enjoy the fulfilment of his yearnings, yearnings which had perceptibly developed in their scope, as his opportunities opened before him. He was quite certain now that something would happen, even if he had to make it happen, which, eventually, would carry him far away from the present, undesirable scene into realms where he might conceivably spread his wings with completer ease. His imagination, no longer fettered, now pictured college to him as a small and unimportant makeshift ambition. Now, rather, in his mind's eye, he stood
