I glanced up from my books one evening. The glow of sunset, hovered along the city-wall. Leaning over its edge, looking down into the meadows, a tall girl was standing. Her back was towards me. She was dressed in the palest green. Her hair was auburn. She held her skirt daringly high, disclosing the daintiest of ankles. Her open-work stockings were also of green to match the rest of her attire. Her companion was Brookins, the assistant chaplain, an effeminate little man, who was known among the undergraduates as the doe-priest. He seemed ill at ease; she was manifestly flirting with him. In the stillness of the garden the penetrating cadence of her gay voice reached me. It was friendly, and had the lazy caressing quality of a summer’s afternoon when bees are humming in and out of flowers. I was tantalized by a haunting memory. She turned her face part way towards me. I caught her mocking profile. The way the red-gold curls fell across her forehead was familiar; and yet I could not remember. She came along the terrace, walking in long, slow, undulating strides. The west shone full upon her. She was brilliant and gracious, and carried herself with an air of challenging pride. Her tall, slim figure broke into exquisite lines as she walked, revealing its shapely frailty. Her narrow face, with its arch expression of innocence, promised a personality full of secrets and disguises.
I stepped across the sill of my window into the garden. They were near enough now for me to catch an occasional word of their conversation. I approached across the lawn towards them. She glanced in my direction casually; then she steadied her gaze. I saw that her eyes were green, specked with gold about the iris. She stooped her head, still gazing at me, and asked a question of the doe-priest in a lowered voice. I heard him speak my name. A bubbling laugh sprang from her lips. She came tripping towards me with her hand extended.
“You’re not going to pretend you don’t know me?”
“I do know you, and yet I can’t recall where we have met or what is your name.”
“Were you ever in Sneard’s garden at the Red House?”
“You’re———”
“Fiesole Cortona, and you’re Dante.”
We stood there holding one another’s hands, searching one another’s faces and laughing gladly.
“Well I never!” I kept repeating. “Fancy meeting you after all these years!”
“Am I much changed?” she questioned.