“Well!” he said aloud. “I might as well go out and walk about. They’ll be back pretty soon, and then——” he shrugged his shoulders. “What’s the use?” he asked himself, apropos of nothing in particular.
Some whim prompted him to board a car going in the direction of Fairview. The May walk he knew would be over by this time, save perhaps for a few stragglers. And he hoped—yet what did he hope?
Tom found himself walking through the little grove where the boys and girls of the college had eaten lunch a few hours before. The place seemed deserted now, though now and then a distant laugh told of some late-staying couple. The sun was almost down, sending golden-red shafts of light slanting through the newly-leafing trees.
Tom turned down a deserted path of beach trees. He walked on, not heeding his course until, as he neared a cross-trail, he heard voices. There was the soft tones of a girl, and the deeper rumble of a youth. Tom stepped back behind a sheltering trunk, and only just in time, for the couple suddenly stepped into view.
“Hasn’t it been a perfect day?” asked the youth.
“Yes—almost,” was his companion’s rather indifferent answer.
“Why not altogether, Miss Tyler?”
Tom started at this. He peered from behind the big beach.
“Oh, nothing is perfect in this world,” was the laughing answer.