"You odious Yankee! I haven't words to express my disgust—abhorrence!"
"Don't try, love needs no words: but I'll tell you; let me put this white rose to your lips; it will turn red at the touch, and in that way you can take your kiss back, if you really want it; then there'll be a fair exchange. I—"
"Hello, there! are you two grafting roses?"
It was Wesley, coming from the lower garden, where the stream was narrowest beyond the high wall of hedge.
"Oh, no, Mr. Boone; Richard here is studying the color in flowers. He has a theory that eclipses Goethe's 'Farbenlehre.'"
"Oh, indeed!" Wesley was quite unconscious of what Goethe's doctrine of colors might be, so he prudently avoided urging fuller particulars regarding Dick's theory, and said, vaguely;
"You have color enough here to theorize on, I'm sure."
"Yes, we have had very satisfactory experiments," Dick assented naïvely, stealing a glance at Rosa.
"But quite inconclusive," she rejoined, moving onward, the two young men following in the penumbra of her wide hat.