CHAPTER XII.
TO CALL A SPIRIT FROM THE VASTY DEEP.
It was when the first wild-flowers of the year had passed away, and scarlet columbine and meadow-rue waved lightly in the sunny glades of the woods, and all the world was green--the new and perfect green of June--that one afternoon Caius, at his father's door, met a visitor who was most rarely seen there.

It was Farmer Day.

He accosted Caius, perhaps a little sheepishly, but with an obvious desire to be civil, for he had a favour to ask which he evidently considered of greater magnitude than Caius did when he heard what it was.

Day's wife was ill.
The doctor of the locality had said more than once that she would not live many days, but she had gone on living some time, it appeared, since this had been first said.

Day did not now call upon Caius as a medical man.