"Come!" she cried, her expression slowly veering toward welcome.
The door swung back and in came Scarborough. Not the awkward youth of last October, but still unable wholly to conceal how much at a disadvantage he felt before the woman he particularly wished to please.
"Yes—I'm ten minutes early," he said, apology in his tone for his instinct told him that he was interrupting, and he had too little vanity to see that the interruption was agreeable. "But I thought you'd be only reading a novel."
For answer she held up the book which lay before her—a solemn volume in light brown calf.
"Analytical geometry," he said; "and on the first day of the finest spring the world ever saw!" He was at the window, looking out longingly—sunshine, and soft air washed clean by the rains; the new-born leaves and buds; the pioneer birds and flowers. "Let's go for a walk. We can do the Vergil to-night."
"YOU—talking of neglecting WORK!" Her smile seemed to him to sparkle as much in the waves of her hair as in her even white teeth and gold-brown eyes. "So you're human, just like the rest of us."
"Human!" He glanced at her and instantly glanced away.
"Do leave that window," she begged. "We must get the Vergil now. I'm reading an essay at the society to-night—they've fined me twice for neglecting it. But if you stand there reminding me of what's going on outside I'll not be able to resist."
"How this would look from Indian Rock!"
She flung open a Vergil text-book with a relentless shake of the head. "I've got the place. Book three, line two forty-five—