"I don't see how you happened to hear me come out," said the girl, laughing and vexed.
"Have you been out in this way before?"
"No; how could I? Lucian has only just come down here. I should a great deal rather tell you everything, Margaret, as fast as I think of it, and I would—only you would be sure to stop it."
"I want to stop this. Give it up—if you care at all for me; I make it a test."
"You know I care; if you put it on that ground, of course I shall have to give it up," said Garda, disconsolately.
"Come back to the house, then," said Margaret, taking her hand.
"No, I'm not going back, I'm going down to the landing," answered the girl. She appeared to think that she had earned this obstinacy by her larger concession.
"But you said you would give up—"
"If we keep back under the trees he cannot see us; I mean what I say—he shall not. But I want to see him, I want to see him go by."
She drew Margaret onward, and presently they reached the shore. "There he comes!" she said—"I hear the oars." And she held tightly to Margaret's hand, as if to keep herself from running out to the platform's edge.