It was a beautiful place in which she was walking. There was probably a marvelous view from those well-hidden mansions behind the stone walls and thick rhododendron growth. And what would the third mansion be like—the one where she was to live?

At last she came to a huge fence, like wrought-iron lacework, towering above her head, and behind it the soft feathery fringe of a beautiful hemlock hedge. It cast a cool shade along the road, and its breath seemed to fill the air with balm. It reminded her of the woods behind the old sawmill at home, and her step quickened eagerly.

The hedge with its iron enclosure reached farther than any of the other estate boundaries she had passed, but at last she came to an opening that was hidden, almost disguised by the thick growth of great trees, which had been increasing the farther she went until now it seemed almost like a forest. Here suddenly the drive swept in by a cool dark curve into dense shade.

She stopped and caught her breath in delight. The sun was hot, and she was very warm and tired. It was like a cooling breath, this lovely shaded way.

She entered cautiously, like Alice going into Wonderland. It seemed unbelievable that she should be entering a place like this and presuming to think she belonged there. Could it be possible that this was the place where she was to spend the summer?

She sat down on her suitcase again and taking off her hat, let the breeze fan her heated forehead. She leaned back and looked up at the cool interlacing branches overhead and drew in a deep breath of the resinous fragrance. Then with quick memory of the car that had swept into that other entrance farther back, she smoothed her hair and hastily put on her hat again, straightening it by the little mirror in her handbag. Someone might drive in here any minute, and she would not wish to be caught this way, even by a servant.

With renewed courage, she took up her suitcase and went on with brisker step up the drive.

Even then it was a good quarter of a mile before she reached the house. The lovely winding drive went for a long distance, cool and deep among the pines and hemlocks, until she began to think she had made a mistake and gone into a forest instead of a gentleman’s driveway. Then, just as she was beginning to get anxious, the foliage thinned, and there came a glimpse of a wonderful stone mansion like a crown upon a rise of ground. She caught her breath in wonder, this time exclaiming aloud. Could this be one man’s house? A mansion indeed! It was like a castle! It could not be that this was the place where she was engaged to serve as secretary! She had somehow made a great mistake, come too far or something. But at least now that she had come, she would go up to the mansion and see it. She could have the excuse that she had missed her way, and once, just once in a lifetime, she would see what a great castle looked like close at hand.

She had some thought of leaving her suitcase back under the bushes till she should return. It would be safe enough hidden under some of those low-hanging hemlocks, and it would be so much easier walking, and so much more dignified than appearing at the door of a place like that to ask the way, carrying a great shabby suitcase.

Then she reflected that something might happen to it—some dog might pull it apart, or a tramp find it, and she could not afford to lose her meager wardrobe. So she toiled on.

The way grew lovelier as she neared the house. Fountains were revealed in nooks by the way, dripping cool water from the rocky crevice of a little unsuspected grotto into a great stone jar that reminded one of Old Testament wells and shepherd girls, or showering soft silver spray into a quiet pool where lazy lilies rested and silent goldfish glided like brilliant phantoms beneath the surface. And higher up in the sunlight there were great bursts of flowers, like embroidery, in borders on the lawns and fringing the terraces. More than once she stopped in ecstasy over the beauty opening up before her, and still the castle seemed far away.

The drive wound out at last, and suddenly the mansion stood before her and was almost overwhelming in its grandeur. Built of rough stone in severe but classic lines, it seemed like some great rock that had not been made with hands. Its battlements, clear cut against the bright afternoon sky, were startling. She could scarcely believe that she was standing so near to something that looked so much like a picture from the old world, so much a thing of history and of the past. Of course it was a reproduction of some great old historic wonder. Nothing modern could be so perfect and so much a thing that seemed to have stood through the ages.

A stone seat withdrawn from the edge of the drive into a shelter of sweeping trees offered harbor while she caught her breath and gathered courage, and she dropped upon it and gazed, gradually turning her eyes from the house itself to the view across the great lawn and down the valley. And now she saw that she had climbed far above the tall hemlocks that fringed the road so thickly, and could look across them, to the hills beyond.