They strolled leisurely up and down the box-bordered paths, Miss Lydia talking in her gentle, monotonous voice, and Dan bending his head as he flicked at the tall grass with his riding-whip.
“He is a great lover of flowers,” said the old lady after he had gone, and thought in her simple heart that she spoke the truth.
For two days Dan's pride held him back, but the third being Sunday, he went over in the afternoon with the pretence of a message from his grandmother. As the day was mild the great doors were standing open, and from the drive he saw Mrs. Ambler sitting midway of the hall, with her Bible in her hand and her class of little negroes at her feet. Beyond her there was a strip of green and the autumn glory of the garden, and the sunlight coming from without fell straight upon the leaves of the open book.
She was reading from the gospel of St. John, and she did not pause until the chapter was finished; then she looked up and said, smiling: “Shall I ask you to join my class, or will you look for the girls out of doors? Virginia, I think, is in the garden, and Betty has just gone riding down the tavern road.”
“Oh, I'll go after Betty,” replied Dan, promptly, and with a gay “good-by” he untied Prince Rupert and started at a canter for the turnpike.
A quarter of a mile beyond Uplands the tavern road branched off under a deep gloom of forest trees. The white sand of the turnpike gave place to a heavy clay soil, which went to dust in summer and to mud in winter, impeding equally the passage of wheels. On either side a thick wood ran for several miles, and the sunshine filtered in bright drops through the green arch overhead.
When Dan first caught sight of Betty she was riding in a network of sun and shade, her face lifted to the bit of blue sky that showed between the tree-tops. At the sound of his horse she threw a startled look behind her, and then, drawing aside from the sunken ruts in the “corduroy” road, waited, smiling, until he galloped up.
“Why, it's never you!” she exclaimed, surprised.
“Well, that's not my fault, Betty,” he gayly returned. “If I had my way, I assure you it would be always I. You mustn't blame a fellow for his ill luck, you know.” Then he laid his hand on her bridle and faced her sternly.
“Look here, Betty, you haven't been treating me right,” he said.