“Ay. Look at the women looking at us. I’m something between a bull and a couple of worms stuck together, I am. See that spink!” he raised his voice for the girls to hear. “Pretty, isn’t he? What for?—And what for do you wear a fancy vest and twist your moustache, Sir! What for, at the bottom! Ha—tell a woman not to come in a wood till she can look at natural things—she might see something—Good night, Sir.”
He marched off into the darkness.
“Coarse fellow, that,” said Leslie when he had rejoined Lettie, “but he’s a character.”
“He makes you shudder,” she replied. “But yet you are interested in him. I believe he has a history.”
“He seems to lack something,” said Emily.
“I thought him rather a fine fellow,” said I.
“Splendidly built fellow, but callous—no soul,” remarked Leslie, dismissing the question.
“No,” assented Emily. “No soul—and among the snowdrops.”
Lettie was thoughtful, and I smiled.
It was a beautiful evening, still, with red, shaken clouds in the west. The moon in heaven was turning wistfully back to the east. Dark purple woods lay around us, painting out the distance. The near, wild, ruined land looked sad and strange under the pale afterglow. The turf path was fine and springy.