"You can always send Howard to the village for the afternoon mail," she suggested, the new warmth in her voice an unconscious demonstration of the truth that all the world loves a lover.
"Thanks, that's fine!" The brightening of Forbes' face quite offset his immediate conscientious warning that she was not to spoil him just because she was sorry for him.
As the Rural Free Delivery brought nothing of consequence on the morning following Forbes' arrival, Howard was despatched to the village after the mid-day meal, leaving Forbes in Agatha's care. Agatha conducted her charge to a creaking rocking chair, in the shadiest angle of the porch, and shoved a foot-stool near. "Now I'll get my knitting," she said blithely, "and we'll talk."
Forbes seemed delighted. "It's too good to be true," he murmured. "I thought they were extinct, the old ladies who sat knitting. It's like stepping into the heart of an old-fashioned story."
Agatha smiled tolerantly. "It's clear you're just back from South America. Up here everybody's knitting, young and old."
"But not like you," he insisted. "I am sure you have an air about it that differentiates your knitting from all this kittenish frolicking with balls of yarn." He turned his wistful face toward her as if it helped to visualize the picture, and then added, "Just the hour for confidences, isn't it?"
Agatha smiled at the dun colored wool in her lap. "A warm day, a cool porch, an old lady knitting, and a young man in love. Of course it's ideal for confidences."
He did not seem in any hurry to take advantage of the opening he had asked for. "I'm afraid I'm going to impose on you," he said, after so long a pause that she wondered whether he were planning to deny her charge. "Howard is a bright kid, and I'm sure he'll prove a satisfactory secretary, but there are a few letters I'd hate to dictate to a boy." He laughed with rather an engaging air of shyness as he added, "I imagine it won't be particularly easy to dictate them even to you."
"Of course not," agreed Agatha, with ready sympathy. "Love-letters seem one's own business more than almost anything in the world." His artless confidences had brought a lovely color to her cheeks. Practical as Agatha believed herself, she was romance-hungry, and it did not matter in the least that in this particular love-affair she was cast for a minor rôle. "And I'll read you her letters, too," she offered joyously. "It will save Howard some trying experiences. Howard's just at the age when he's horribly embarrassed by anything in the shape of sentiment."
"Thank you. I'd any amount rather you read them," returned Forbes gratefully. "But they won't be sentimental letters, at all. Howard could read them without finding a word that would bring a blush to his maiden cheek."