The lovers were sauntering in Kensington Gardens when he said this--not for the first time--and the hour was so early that few people were about. Audrey had risen at six o'clock to meet Ralph at seven in the morning near the Round Pond, and save for the handful of working men and office-workmen, who were taking short cuts to their various employments, they had the whole delightful paradise to themselves. The sky was of a turquoise hue, not yet over-warmed by the sun, and both trees and sward looked as though they had been newly washed in the dews of night. At that early hour everything seemed paler and more delicate than in the fierce glare of noonday, and "the silent workings of the dawn"--to use Keats's wonderful expression--were still in progress. A cool, dewy zephyr was breathing across the green expanse, and the leaves of many trees talked joyously. London lay all round, stirring alertly under the faint dun cloud of smoke, but the fragrant Eden of the Gardens preserved its almost primeval calm. And these two walked therein, like a modern Adam and Eve, with a sense that the surrounding loveliness exactly expressed their unspoken feelings.
"I wish we could walk here all day," said Shawe, trying to express the inexpressible, and grudging the swift passing of the golden moments.
"We should only be two in a crowd," replied Audrey, with the more prosaic instinct of women. "Endless people come to the Gardens during the day. If they were sensible they would be here now. I can't understand why the silly things remain in bed when the weather is so perfect."
"Perhaps not one of them has an Audrey to meet."
Miss Branwin laughed gaily. "I daresay every young man has an Audrey of his own, just as every girl has a Ralph."
"Then why aren't they walking here along with us?"
"Ah, they know we wish to be alone, and so have the good sense to stop in bed. And then"--she broke off laughing--"what nonsense we talk!"
"Delicious nonsense, I think. Let us go on talking, as we'll have enough commonsense during the day. Don't you think"--Ralph slipped an eager arm round her slender waist--"that you might--"
She drew back from his approaching lips with a blush, and dexterously twisted away to a safe distance. "Certainly not. Those workmen would see us."
"And envy me," replied Ralph, sentimentally, glancing round meanwhile for some secluded spot. "Don't you think that we might sit under this elm? It's not so open to--to--er--to observation, you know. May I smoke?"