A winding, mossy path, across which gnarled roots of trees made easy steps, led slightly upwards. The trees were not yet in full leaf; the sycamores still held some of their dainty rose-pink sheaths, from which the brilliant translucent green was breaking. The larches, enveloped in a mysterious filmy green mist, wavered in the sunshine. All the underwood was in full leaf. It sprang from a carpet of russet and yellow,—the leaves of yester year; nestling between them were clumps of primroses. Their pure pale yellow stars burnt softly above their dark bed. Here and there the ground was white with frail anemones.
Bridget dived into the thicket with a rapturous exclamation, and began to fill her basket, heedless of Carey’s laughing assurances of open spaces farther on.
The rest of the party walked on more soberly. When they emerged—Bridget with loosened hair where the sweeping branches had caught it, but triumphant, with half filled basket—they were out of sight. She sent a swift glance up the empty, sun-flecked path.
“The road is quite easy to follow,” Carey hastened to say. “It leads in a half-circle back again to the farm, though it’s a good long walk. We shall find our way, though they seem to have deserted us.” They walked in silence for a moment—a silence which Bridget broke with a question about some book.
Carey replied with an eagerness somewhat out of proportion to the subject; but the conversation, once started, did not flag.
He did not look at her as they walked, but kept his eyes fixed on the winding wood-path. He spoke fluently, as usual, but to Bridget his talk was mechanical. Her thoughts wandered; it seemed to her impossible to keep up the strain of even conversation much longer. Her heart began to beat, at first with slow, heavy throbs, then faster and faster, as she struggled to keep her voice steady. In spite of herself, her hands shook. Two or three of the flowers on the top of her basket were scattered on the path.
Carey stooped for them. As he put them into the basket his hand touched hers.
He drew it back quickly, as though he had been stung; and at the moment their eyes met.
Bridget’s face was white.
“You are tired,” he said quickly, with an effort. “You are not looking well. Let us sit down and rest a little. I’ve walked too fast for you. What a brute I am!”