(Oh, a very good three miles, during which he would have Aurea’s undivided company—what a piece of luck!)
For some little time the couple proceeded in silence—a sensitive silence. During the interval since their last meeting, they had accomplished a vast amount of very special thinking—many disturbing, dominating, and dangerous thoughts had entered the young lady’s brain, and she said to herself—
“I must keep perfectly composed, and if ever he intends to speak freely, now—now is the time! To think of us two alone on Yampton Hills, three miles away from home!”
Somehow those three miles held a thrilling prospect. Wynyard, for his part, was longing to utter what was in his mind; here was his one grand opportunity; and yet for several hundred yards a strange silence hung between them, though the man was burning to speak and the girl was longing to listen; meanwhile moments, precious as life itself, were ebbing fast! At last the conversation began to trickle; the topics were the choir, the boy scouts, old Thunder’s pig, and Mrs. Hogben’s face-ache—a spent cartridge in the path introduced sport and shooting.
“I wonder why men are so keen on killing things?” said Aurea.
“I believe we inherit it from our ancestors, who had to kill wild creatures or starve. I must say I like shooting.”
“Oh, do you!”—a blank pause—“the only sport I can imagine any pleasure in, is hunting.”
“Do you hunt?”
“No; I only wish I did; but Aunt Bella thinks it so improper for a woman to follow the hounds, and father could not escort me.”
“But parsons do hunt.”