CHAPTER IV.
It was Meg's twenty-first birthday. She woke early, and went into the garden while the dew was still thick on the grass, and there was a wet haze, precursor of a broiling day, over everything.
"How old I am growing!" she thought, as she shut the door softly behind her and smiled with pleasure, and a most youthful sense of adventure, at being out at that hour. She buried her nose in a cluster of seven-sister roses, and their fragrant wet little faces covered hers with dew. Meg was too fond of flowers to pick them.
How lovely it was! The earth smelt so sweet, the spider's webs sparkled like silver traceries.
It was an enchanted land, seen through the mist; even the stones on the gravel path showed wonderful colours, though they felt cold through thin slippers.
The girl looked as if she had stepped out of a fairy story herself, while she wandered along with a soft wonder in her eyes. Her mind was filled with guesses as to what would happen to her in the year to come. A birthday was a fresh turning-point to Meg, from which she tried to peep down a vista of possibilities.
She leant over the garden gate presently, resting her round white arms on it, and gazing idly up the quiet road.
The flickering shadows played on her face, and made leafy patterns on her white dress, and the honeysuckle touched her shoulder caressingly.