"Yes, I do. And if you look a little farther, ought she to sacrifice the happiness of the man who loves her, in addition to her own?"
She blushed again, more deeply, and glanced away from him over the ragged garden steeped in the languorous peace of a summer sunset. "You see"--she hesitated--"I know nothing about--love." The word was spoken timidly, with modest reluctance.
"Sooner or later you are bound to learn its meaning," he said, controlling his impulse to declare that he would teach her. He recognised the risk of precipitancy; she must not be alarmed. As it was, she turned uneasily aside avoiding his gaze; said they ought to go back, it was getting late, Mrs. Coventry would be waiting for him; nervously polite little sentences.
In silence he followed her along the path that led to the door in the garden wall, noting the grace of her slender form, the glint of the curls that lay on her neck, the cream of the skin beneath the curls.
When they arrived at the door he said abruptly:
"I watched you go through here that morning. You had no hat on, and you were singing a hymn."
He was trying to close the door that was warped and stiff, so he missed the puzzled astonishment in her eyes.
"But how could you have seen me? It was ever so long before you came to the house."
"It was why I came to the house." He banged the door impatiently and faced her. "It was why I came back," he added with emphasis. Colour flooded Rafella's face; he thought how adorably she blushed.
"Oh," she gasped; "but I thought it was because of a stone in your horse's shoe. Didn't you tell the truth?" she questioned severely.