'That's so, that's so,' returned Giles coolly to this heat, 'but I don't say he would make a bad pair for just so much as the boundary walk.'
'How!' said Christian 'but she will walk with me—she's my cousin.'
'Have you asked her?'
'No.'
'Well, I think she's worth an asking. She's shy, and she's nice, and she's got a spirit too, and more than one, I wager, won't be backward. Rhoda! Rhoda! why, what's this grave face you are bringing us, my pretty?'
The girl's eyes addressed Christian's with childlike candour and wonder. 'Why is it,' she said, 'that the mother of that tall Philip doubles her thumb when you pass by?'
He flushed with knit brows, but laughed and jested: 'I guess because she does not like the colour of my hair.' But Rhoda had noted a pause, and a quick turn of the eye upon Giles.
'When the boundary is walked, Rhoda, will you pair with me?'
'Oh!' she said, 'Philip wanted to bespeak me, and I said him no, till my uncle should have had the refusal of me first.'
She curtsied before the old man in bright solicitation.