My lord thought of Miss Chressham as he followed her friend down the rose-covered alley.
"I am glad that you did not write." Selina Boyle spoke suddenly. He saw her eyes, dark and soft, in the trembling shadow of her hat as they turned to him.
She was grave now, and pale, but her expression was that of pure happiness.
"I should not have known what to say," answered my lord, also with some gravity, and truth.
"I understand it all, without any word from you," she smiled. "Of course, you knew that I should——"
They came out on to a square of grass, in the centre of which stood a stone fountain clasped by heavy crimson roses. Beyond was a grove of beech-trees; through the boughs the sunset light fell in a glory; facing the fountain was a garden wall, overgrown with moss and tufts of grass; beneath this a row of straw beehives; the other side was the rose garden, not yet in full bloom, but a revelry of green.
There was no water in the fountain. In the basin grew white, sweet-smelling pinks, and on the edge of it Miss Boyle seated herself and clasped her hands in her lap.
"Do you not find it sweet here?" she asked. "You have never seen my home before."
She might have added with truth that he had never known her before. There was something in her rapt face that he was afraid of. He felt an alien in the garden, a stranger by her side; yet his fickle taste found this sweet after the noisy life of town, and Miss Boyle, seated before her beehives, even more winning than Miss Boyle, the beauty of the Wells.
For a while they were both silent, looking at the clear space of sky above the beech-trees.