“I think I know,” said the vicar, smiling. “But come, you must walk home sharply. I’m a bit of a doctor in my way. You won’t mind my company, I hope. We must be very good friends.”
“I’m sure we shall,” said Eve, frankly, as she glanced once more at her companion, and the next minute he was chatting to her about the contents of her basket.
“Then you understand botany?” she said, eagerly, and he looked down with pleasure at the bright, animated countenance at his side.
“Oh, yes, a little. And you do, I see?”
“Oh, a very little,” said Eve; “the hard Latin words are so puzzling.”
“But you can learn plenty of botany without troubling yourself over the long names; they will come to you imperceptibly.”
Meanwhile Daisy, who had been forgotten, had followed on a few yards behind, looking very angry and indignant at the way in which she was neglected, while the young workman walking by her side seemed as angry, but with a dash of the savage in his face.
Both looked straight before them, and neither spoke, each going on as if in utter ignorance of the companions presence.
“I shall have to give you some lessons when I begin making my collection of specimens,” said the vicar, after a few more observations.
“Will you?” exclaimed Eve, eagerly; and then, retailing the fact that she had known this stranger but a few minutes, she tried to qualify her remark, failed dismally, and began to feel exceedingly hot and conscious, when there was a diversion. They had been gradually nearing the town, and had reached a spot where the moorland gave place to cultivated soil, when a young man, dressed in a rather fast style, and with a cigar in his mouth, suddenly leaped over a stile, and started and looked quite awkward on finding himself face to face with this group.