She had a great success. Spens colored.
"Well," he said, "I don't pretend to be a musician, but it has always been agreed that I had an excellent ear."
"In Green Springs, Connecticut?"
He did not answer, but moved gloomily away. Two or three times she heard him start an air and cut it short. A smile flickered across her face. So sweet to her was it to be the aggressor that she did not return behind the white stones, but remained, like a cat at a rat-hole, waiting beside the fire to which Spens would have to return eventually.
She had resolved that it must be kindly yet firmly made clear to him that he was not behaving like a gentleman, and if, as seemed possible, he did not understand all that the word implied, she felt quite competent to explain it to him.
Perhaps the idea that his conduct was not quite up even to his own standards had already occurred to him, for when he returned he carried a peace-offering.
He stood before her, holding something toward her. "I notice," he said, "that you go about in the sun bare-headed. You oughtn't to do that, and so I have made you this," and she saw the green mass in his hands was leaves carefully fashioned into the shape of a hat.
It may perhaps be forgiven to Miss Wilbur that her heart sank. Nevertheless, she took the offering, expressing her gratitude with a little too much volubility. "I must put it on at once," she said. Green had never become her, but she placed it firmly on her head.
Spens studied it critically. "It fits you exactly," he observed with pleasure. "You see I could only guess at the size. Isn't it fortunate that I guessed so exactly right!"