"How beautiful everything is to-day!" he said, as he stepped to her side. He felt as if he had said, "How beautiful you are!"
She flashed a quick, inquiring glance at him.
"Yes; June can be beautiful with us. Still, there is a beauty more mature, when the sickle is about to be thrust into the grain."
He did not hear what she said. He was thinking of the power that lay in the oval of her face, in the fluffy tangle of her hair. Ah! now he knew. With that upward glance she brought back his boy love, his teacher whom he had worshiped as boys sometimes will, with a love as pure as winter starlight. Yes, now it was clear. There was the same flex of the splendid waist, the same slow lift of the head, and steady, beautiful eyes.
As she talked, he was a youth of seventeen, he was lying at his teacher's feet by the river while she read wonderful love stories. There were others there, but they did not count. Then the tears blurred his eyes; he remembered walking behind her dead body as it was borne to the hillside burying ground, and all the world was desolate for him.
He became aware that Miss Powell was looking at him with startled eyes. He hastened to apologize and explain. "Pardon me; you look so much like a schoolboy idol—I—I seem to see her again. I didn't hear what you said, you brought the past back so poignantly."
There was something in his voice which touched her, but before he could go on they were joined by Mr. and Mrs. Blakesly and one of the other teachers. There was a dancing light in Mrs. Blakesly's eyes as she looked at Ware. She had just been saying to her husband: "What a splendid figure Miss Powell is! How well they look together! Wouldn't it be splendid if——"
"Oh, my dear, you're too bad. Please don't match-make any more to-day. Let Nature attend to these things," Mr. Blakesly replied with manifest impatience; "Nature attended to our case."
"I have no faith in Nature any more. I want to have at least a finger in the pie myself. Nature don't work in all cases. I'm afraid Nature can't in his case."
"Careful! He'll hear you, my dear."