Into his eyes as he looked leaped a light like the flame of the sunshine beyond the shadows on the hill; swiftly he stepped forward and kissed the girl's shoulder where the thin yellow stuff of her dress showed the outward curve to the arm. She turned and faced him, without a word. There was no need of speech: anger battled with unconfessed joy in her changing face.
"How dare you?" she said presently, when she had won her lips to curves of scorn. "The manners of the gods seem strange to mortals."
"I love you," he answered simply.
Then there was no sound save that of the water, dropping over the edge of the great basin to the soft grass beneath.
"Can't you forgive me?" he asked humbly. "I am profoundly sorry; only, my temptation was superhuman."
"I had thought that you were that, too," said the girl in a whisper.
"There is no excuse, I know; there is only a reason. I love you, little girl. I love your questioning eyes, and your firm mouth, and your smooth brown hair"—
"Stop!" begged Daphne, putting out her hands. "You must not say such things to me, for I am not free to hear them. I must go away," and she turned toward home. But he grasped one of the outstretched hands and drew her to the stone bench near the fountain, and then seated himself near her side.
"Now tell me what you mean," he said quietly.
"I mean," she answered, with her eyes cast down, "that two years ago I promised to love some one else. I must not even hear what you are trying to say to me."