"I am not the kind of man to be whistled back," he said, fiercely. It was an appeal and a defiance, for he was just the kind of man, and they both knew it.
"Of course not."
"That is your last word?"
"My last word."
He dropped her hand and half turned to go.
She made no sign.
Then he strode violently out of the wood without looking behind him. At the little gate he stopped a moment, listening intently. No recalling voice reached him. Poets did not know what they were talking about. With a trembling hand he slammed the gate and departed.
Rachel remained a long time sitting on the wooden bench, so long that the stooping sun found out the solemn, outstretched arms of the cedar, and touched them till they gleamed green as a beetle's wing. Each little twig and twiglet was made manifest, raw gold against the twilight that lurked beneath the heavy boughs.
She sat so still that a squirrel came tiptoeing across the moss, and struck tail momentarily to observe her. He looked critically at her, first with one round eye, and then, turning his sleek head, with the other, and decided that she was harmless.
Presently a robin dropped down close to her, flashing up his gray under wing as he alighted, and then flew up into the cedar, and from its sun-stirred depths said his say.