“I am afraid it will have to.”
“Very well, very well. I shall be down again in a day or two. Of course, waiting may have some effect upon the price. To-day I was empowered to . . . You don't care to hear? Very well. So glad to have met you, Mr. Paine. Of course you will not mention the subject of our interview to anyone. Business secrets, you know. Thank you, thank you. And I will see you again—Thursday, shall we say?”
I refused to say Thursday, principally because he had said it first. I suggested Saturday instead. He agreed, shook hands as if I were an old friend from whom he parted with regret, and left me.
No, I did not like Mr. Keene. He was too polite and too familiar. And, as I thought over his words, the whole prospectus of the Bay Shore Development Company seemed singularly vague. The proposal to buy my land was definite enough, but the rest of it was, apparently, very much in the air. There was too much secrecy about it. No one was to tell anyone anything. I was glad I had insisted upon time for consideration. I intended to consider thoroughly.
CHAPTER XIV
When I left the boat house I did not go directly home, but wandered along the beach. I had puzzled my brain with Mr. Keene and his errand until I determined not to puzzle it any longer that day. If my suspicions were unfounded and existed merely because of my dislike of the Bay Shore Company's representative, then they were not worth worry. If they were well founded I had almost a week in which to discover the fact. I would dismiss the whole matter from my thoughts. The question as to whether or not I would sell the land at all to anybody, which was, after all, the real question, I resolved to put off answering until I had had my talk with Mother.
I walked on by the water's edge until I reached the Lane; turning into that much coveted strip of territory I continued until I came opposite the Colton mansion, where, turning again, I strolled homeward by the path through the grove. Unconsciously my wandering thoughts strayed to Mabel Colton. It was here that I had met her on two occasions. I had an odd feeling that I should meet her here again, that she was here now. I had no reason for thinking such a thing, certainly the wish was not father to the thought, but at every bend in the path, as the undergrowth hid the way, I expected, as I turned the corner, to see her coming toward me.
But the path was, save for myself, untenanted. I was almost at its end, where the pines and bushes were scattering and the field of daisies, now in full bloom, began, when I heard a slight sound at my left. I looked in the direction of the sound and saw her. She was standing beneath a gnarled, moss-draped old pine by the bluff edge, looking out over the bay.
I stopped, involuntarily. Then I moved on again, as noiselessly as I could. But at my first step she turned and saw me. I raised my hat. She bowed, coldly, so it seemed to my supersensitive imagination, and I replaced the hat and continued my walk. I thought I heard the bushes near which she stood rustle as if she had moved, but I did not look back.