There was a subdued and dewy brilliancy in Kathleen's eyes, a bright freshness to her cheeks, radiantly and absurdly youthful; and something else—something so indefinable, so subtle, that only another woman's instinct might divine it—something invisible and inward, which transfigured her with a youthful loveliness almost startling.
They looked at one another. Geraldine, conscious of something she could not understand, glanced again at her sulky brother.
"What's amiss, Scott?" she asked. "Has anything gone wrong anywhere?"
Scott, pretending to be very busy untangling Grandcourt's cast from the branches of a lusty young birch, said, "No, of course not," and the girl, wondering, turned to Kathleen, who sustained her questioning eyes without a tremor.
"What's the matter with Scott?" asked his sister. "He's the guiltiest-looking man—why, it's absurd, Kathleen! Upon my word, the boy is blushing!"
"What!" exclaimed Scott so furiously that everybody laughed. And presently Geraldine asked again where Duane was.
"Rosalie Dysart is canoeing on the Gray Water, and she hailed him and he left us and went down to the river," said Kathleen carelessly.
"Did Duane join her?"
"I think so—" She hesitated, watching Geraldine's sombre eyes. "I really don't know," she added. And, in a lower voice: "I wish either Duane or Rosalie would go. They certainly are behaving unwisely."
Geraldine turned and looked through the woods toward the Gray Water.