At twenty she had the slender immaturity of a girl of sixteen. Her slim figure made her seem taller than she was.
Her hat was one of those sagging straw affairs. It tied under the chin with lilac ribbon. Her thin white gown had lilac ribbons on it, too. So did her sun-shade.
She was very late. She walked to the gate, keeping to the brick path on account of her white shoes and stockings.
Here she consulted her wrist-watch. There was no use hurrying now. She glanced up and down the road—possibility of a belated neighbour giving her a lift to the village.
No, it was too late to hurry. Almost too late to go at all.
She looked up at the gate lilacs, broke off a heavy, mauve cluster, inhaled the fragrance.
For a little while, still, she lingered on the chance of a passing vehicle. Finally she returned to her room, took a book from her pillow, took “the key to the fields,” and sauntered off through the hillside orchard, now a wilderness of pink and white bloom.
Everywhere the azure wings of blue-birds; the peach-red of a robin’s breast; the broad golden glint of a flicker flashing through high white bloom.
The breeze which had fluttered her muslin curtains was busy up here, too, blowing white butterflies out of their courses and spreading silvery streaks across tall grasses.
On the hill-top she paused, looking out over the world of May.