“You will not be able to help it,” was the reply. “They are both determined young men and their minds are made up.”
“So is mine,” replied Joy.
Yet it was as her hostess said. On the day of the shoot, Geoffrey Bracknell walked with her across the moor towards the “butts” built of turf and behind which they were to wait for the driven birds. They reached her own shelter first, and as she dropped to an improvised seat, Geoffrey Bracknell halted and looked down at her.
“Miss Gargrave, there is—er—something that I want to say, and to—a—ask you.”
She looked up and met his honest eyes, eyes that to her mind recalled not his brother, her husband, but the eyes of his cousin Corporal Bracknell of the Mounted Police. What she read there brought a quick flush to her face, and she hastily put up a protesting hand.
“Please, Mr. Bracknell, don’t! Don’t spoil our friendship!”
“Ah!” said the young man, his face paling a little, “you understand what I want. Is it really quite impossible?”
“Yes,” she answered with directness, “it is quite impossible.”
Geoffrey Bracknell whistled softly to himself. He had suffered a blow, but he strove to behave like a gentleman. “Then I am sorry to have troubled you, Miss Gargrave. Of course I knew that I was not—er—worthy—”