And then there was a pause, during which she unfixed another white sheet from against the gentle blue of the evening sky.
“You’ll excuse me if I’m too free, miss,” said Frewin presently. “But you see—well, there, it was talk o’ the village, so ye must ’ave ’eard it with the rest! I was fooled once, and that’s the truth, and I don’t mean to be fooled again.”
There was no answer, and Letty’s face was somehow hidden behind the blushing blossom of a low branch of the apple-tree.
“So p’r’aps you’d excuse me,” he repeated, “if I was to ask you, as a plain man, whether you was a-walkin’ with Lambert o’ Bank ’Oliday when I was in town?”
The face emerged from behind its leafy screen, and was no longer tremulous but haughty.
“Well, it is a queer question,” said she, “and no mistake! But,” she added quickly, seeing him turn away,—“well, there, I don’t mind answering: Mr. Lambert asked me, but I didn’t fancy ’im. I sat alone all day.”
And it may have been the shame of such a confession from an acknowledged village belle that called the blush again to her cheek.
“Ye don’t say so, now,” declared the man, pleased. “Ye see, ye took Lambert’s loan as against mine the other day at the station, and, one thing and another—well, there—a man ain’t goin’ to be fooled twice, you bet.”
At the last word she hung her head lower than ever, and there was another pause.
At last he said, sheepishly now: “But I don’t s’pose ye would walk with me next Sunday. Though it seems clearin’ up for a nice day.”