Subdued sounds of life came to Mildred's ear ere she closed the Book; servants were astir setting the house to rights and preparing breakfast for the numerous guests, most of whom still lingered in the land of dreams.
Mildred made a rapid but neat toilet, then stole softly from the room, promising herself a stroll through the grounds while yet the quiet and dewy freshness of early morning lingered there.
In one of the wide cool porches of the hotel a young man paced to and fro with hasty, agitated step, glancing up again and again with longing impatience at the windows of a certain room on the second floor. Pausing in his walk, he drew out his watch.
"Only a brief half-hour!" he sighed. "Am I not to see her at all?"
But at that instant there stepped from the open doorway a slight, graceful, girlish figure in a dainty white muslin, a bunch of wildflowers in her belt, a broad-brimmed straw hat in her hand; and with a low exclamation, "Ah, at last!" he hurried to meet her.
She started slightly at sight of him and sent a hurried glance this way and that, as if meditating flight.
"O Mildred, don't run away! why should you avoid me?" he said entreatingly, holding out his hand.
There was a scarcely perceptible hesitation in her manner as she gave him hers.
"Good-morning," she said softly. "Is anything wrong? I think you look troubled."