The hayfields shone, ready for mowing. Under the wind the shimmering hay grass moved like waves of hot air, up and up the hill.
She slipped through the gap by Morfe Bridge and went up the fields to the road on Greffington Edge. She lay down among the bracken in the place where Roddy and she had sat two years ago when they had met Mr. Sutcliffe coming down the road.
The bracken hid her. It made a green sunshade above her head. She shut her eyes.
"Kikeriküh! sie glaubten
Es wäre Hahnen geschrei."
That was all nonsense. Maurice Jourdain would never have crept in the little hen-house and hidden himself under the straw. He would never have crowed like a cock. Mark and Roddy would. And Harry Craven and Jimmy. Jimmy would certainly have hidden himself under the straw.
Supposing Jimmy had had a crystal mind. Shining and flashing. Supposing he had never done that awful thing they said he did. Supposing he had had Mark's ways, had been noble and honourable like Mark—
The interminable reverie began. He was there beside her in the bracken. She didn't know what his name would be. It couldn't be Jimmy or Harry or any of those names. Not Mark. Mark's name was sacred.
Cecil, perhaps.
Why Cecil? Cecil?—You ape! You drivelling, dribbling idiot! That was the sort of thing Aunt Charlotte would have thought of.
She got up with a jump and stretched herself. She would have to run if she was to be home in time for tea.