Gilian was disappointed with her. “But you think you see them, you think very hard,” he said, “and if you think very hard they will be there quite true.”
Nan stamped her foot angrily. “You are daft,” said she. “I don’t believe you ever saw them yourself.”
“I tell you I did,” he protested hotly.
“Were you up the tree?” she pressed, looking him through with eyes that then and always wrenched the prosaic truth from him.
He flushed more redly than in his eagerness of showing the nest, his eyes fell, he stammered.
“Well,” said he, “I did not climb the tree. What is the good when I know what is there? It is a heron’s nest.”
“But there might have been no eggs and no birds in it at all,” she argued.
“That’s just it,” said he eagerly. “Lots of boys would be for climbing and finding that out, and think how vexatious it would be after all that trouble! I just made the eggs and the young ones out of my own mind, and that is far better.”
At the innocence of the explanation Nan laughed till the woods rang. Her brown hair fell upon her neck and brow, the flowers tumbled at her feet all mingled and beautiful as if summer has been raining on its queen. A bird rose from the thicket, chuck-chucking in alarm, then fled, trailing behind him a golden chain of melody.