CHAPTER IX
THE LAND OF ENCHANTMENT
"I do not think," the girl with the blue eyes said, diffidently, "that I gave you permission to sit down here."
"I do not believe," Burton admitted, "that I asked for it. Still, having just saved your life—"
"Saved my life!"
"Without a doubt," Burton insisted, firmly. She laughed in his face. When she laughed, she was good to look upon. She had firm white teeth, light brown hair which fell in a sort of fringe about her forehead, and eyes which could be dreamy but were more often humorous. She was not tall and she was inclined to be slight, but her figure was lithe, full of beautiful spring and reach.
"You drove away a cow!" she exclaimed. "It is only because I am rather idiotic about cows that I happened to be afraid. I am sure that it was a perfectly harmless animal."
"On the contrary," he assured her seriously, "there was something in the eye of that cow which almost inspired me with fear. Did you notice the way it lashed its tail?"
"Absurd!"
"At least," he protested, "you cannot find it absurd that I prefer to sit here with you in the shadow of your lilac trees, to trudging any further along that dusty road?"