Patience followed his glance. Beverly stood at the foot of the slope, with distorted face.
“Oh, dear,” she said, “that is Mr. Peele. I am afraid he is going to be disagreeable. Of course I am not obliged to stay—but in a way I am.”
Steele ran the boat into the dock, handed her out, and reefed the sail before he spoke. Then he turned and looked at her squarely.
“Would you rather I did not come?” he asked.
“No! No! I want you to come. I’ll think it over and write you—or—I wonder if you are horrid like most men and would misunderstand me if I asked you always to come on a certain day and meet me in that wood up there, instead of going to the house?”
“Look here,” he said in his old business-like tone, “just let me set your mind at rest. I haven’t the slightest intention of making love to you. In the first place I am just now tired and sick of that sort of thing—a state a man does get into occasionally, although a woman will never believe it. In the second place I like to think of you as sui generis; a woman on a pedestal. It is very refreshing. A week from to-day I’ll be in that wood, and I’ll stay there from four to six whether you come or not. There comes my train.”
“You must flag it. Hurry. I’ll expect you Thursday.”
XIII
“Who is that man?” thundered Beverly, as she crossed the track behind the train.
Patience raised her eyebrows. “What have you to do with my visitors?”