She shook her head, gently but very firmly. "Such things are impossible."
"Because I have a wife at Garden Green?"
She nodded.
"Because you have a wife, and because—I had really quite forgotten to mention it before, but as a matter of fact I am half engaged to someone myself."
He went suddenly white.
"You are not serious?" he demanded. "Perfectly," she assured him. "I can't think how I forgot it."
"Does he come here to see you?" Burton asked, jealously.
"Not very often. He has to work hard." Burton leaned back in his seat. The music of life seemed suddenly to be playing afar off—so far that he could only dimly catch the strains. The wind, too, must have changed—the perfume of the roses reached him no more.
"I thought you understood," he said slowly.
She did not speak again for several moments. Then she rose a little abruptly to her feet.