"Yes, about you, also."
They both smiled.
She was so straight and slender and pretty in her white flannels and white outing hat—her attitude so confident, so charmingly determined, that she seemed to him even younger than she really was—a delightful, illogical, fresh and fearless school-girl, translated by some flash of magic from her school hither, and set down unruffled and unstartled upon her light, white-shod feet.[300]
Even now it amazed him to realise that she really understood nothing of the lonely perils lately confronting her in this desolate place.
For if there were nothing actually to fear from the wild beasts of the region, that which the beasts themselves feared might have confronted her at any moment. He shuddered as he thought of it.
And what would she have done if suddenly clutched by fever? What would she have done if a white-mouthed moccasin had struck her ankle—or if it had been the diamond-set Death himself?
"You don't mind my speaking plainly, do you?" he said bluntly.
"Why, no, of course not." She looked at him inquiringly.
"Don't stray far away from me, will you?"
"What?"