“You have had quite a walk,” he said. “If you will wait while I put up the load, I’ll take you back.”
Muriel sat down and watched him fling the grass in heavy forkfuls on to the growing pile, until at last he clambered up upon the frame supporting it and, pulling some out and ramming the rest back, proceeded to excavate a hollow.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
“Making a nest for you,” he told her with a laugh. “Now, if you’ll get up.”
While she mounted by the wheel he stood on the edge of the wagon, leaning down toward her. There did not seem to be much foothold, the grass looked slippery, and the hollow he had made was beyond her reach, but she seized the hand he held out and he swung her up. For a moment his fingers pressed tightly upon her waist, and then she was safe in the hollow, smiling at him as he found a precarious seat on the rack.
“You couldn’t see how you were going to get up, but you didn’t hesitate,” he said with a soft laugh, when he had started his team.
“No,” she smiled back at him. “Somehow you inspire one with confidence. I didn’t think you would let me fall.”
“Curious, isn’t it?”
She reclined in the recess among the grass, which yielded to her limbs in a way that gave her a sense of voluptuous ease. Her pose, although scarcely a conventional one, showed to advantage the fine contour of her form; and the lilac-tinted dress that flowed in classic lines about her made a patch of cool restful color on the warm ocher of her surroundings. It was easy to read the man’s admiration in his glance, and she became suddenly filled with mischievous daring.
“Cyril,” she said, “you are either an excellent actor, or else—”