"It is just that," replied Blythe, "which I find it so difficult to express. I fear to venture too close to the quicksands. But I might as well take the risk. I did not exactly mean to use the word 'barrier.' You make quite another appeal to me than as a ward to a guardian. My imagination is far more involved than that. Perhaps I take a roundabout method, Louise, of saying that, in spite of my approaching guardianship, I sometimes find myself presuming to hope that a time might come when you would be willing to accept my devotion as a man."
"That time," quietly replied Louise, pretending to adjust her hat so as to screen her face with her arm, "has already come." She had no penchant for evasiveness, and coquetry was apart from her; she spoke words that her heart brimmed to her lips.
Blythe, his face transfigured, caught himself reeling a bit in his saddle. Her words, so quietly and frankly spoken, had suddenly cleared what he had not hoped would be anything but a pathway of brambles. He swayed so close to her that their faces almost touched, and for a mere instant he was conscious of the fragrance of her pure breath, aware to the core of him of an intoxicating propinquity of which he had not until that moment dreamed.
"Perhaps I misunderstood you, Louise," he said, hoarse of a sudden, reining out and settling himself sidewise in his saddle so that he could see her. "It is impossible that I did not misunderstand you."
Louise, gazing straight ahead, but with misty eyes, shook her head. She had no more words. And her silent negation told him, better than words, that he had not misunderstood her.
They rode without speaking for the remainder of the way back to Laura's. Just before they drew up to the curb, where he was to assist her to dismount, Blythe broke the long reverie that had pinioned them.
"I only came to know the meaning of what is called 'the joy of living' an hour ago, Louise," Blythe said to her then.
A moment later he was lifting her from her horse, and the sky swirled before his eyes as, for a rocketing instant, he held her in his strong arms and felt her warm breath (as of hyacinths, he thought) upon his face. He rode away leading her horse, and their parting was of the eyes only.
Louise, a happy brooding expression on her face, walked in upon Laura, who was deeply snuggled on a many-pillowed couch, and sat down, pre-occupiedly tapping a gloved palm with her riding-crop, without a word.
"Well, dear?" said Laura, glancing at her.