“For three or four months in the year England is the most beautiful country in the world,” he said. “We haven’t your great pines and foaming rivers, but, even in the land from which I come in the rugged north, every valley is a garden. It’s all so smooth and green and well cared for. One could fancy that somebody loved every inch of it—once you get outside the towns. I said the dales were gardens—in summer they’re more like Paradise.”
It was evident that the exile’s longing for the old land was awake within him, and Ida nodded sympathetically.
“Won’t you go on?” she begged.
“Ah!” said Weston. “If I could make you see them—the wonderful green of the larch woods, the bronze of the opening oaks, and the smooth velvet pastures between the little river and the gleaming limestone at the foot of the towering fell! All is trimmed and clipped and cared for, down to the level hedgerows and the sod on the roadside banks, and every here and there white hamlets, with little old-world churches, nestle among-the trees. You see, it has grown ripe and mellow, while your settlements are crude and new.”
The girl sat silent a brief space. She had read of the old country, and seen pictures of it, and it seemed to her that his term, a garden, described parts, at least, of it rather efficiently.
Then, though he had already assured her that he meant to stay in the bush, she wondered whether he never longed to gather a flower of that trim garden. In fact, it suddenly became a question of some moment to her.
“You will go back to it some day?”
“No,” said Weston, with a little wry smile; “I don’t think so. After all, why should I?”
Ida was sensible of a certain satisfaction, but she desired to make more sure.
“There must be somebody you would wish to see, or somebody who would care to see you?”