“Was it necessary to remind you?” he asked with deliberate malice.
She flushed up, vexed, silent, then looked directly at him with beautiful hostile eyes. “What do you mean, Mr. Siward? Are you taking our harmless, idle badinage as warrant for an intimacy unwarranted?”
“Have I offended?” he asked, so impassively that a flash of resentment brought her to her feet, angry and self-possessed.
“How far have we to go?” she asked quietly.
He rose to his feet, turned, hailing the keeper, repeating the question. And at the answer they both started forward, the dog ranging ahead through a dense growth of beech and chestnut, over a high brown ridge, then down, always down along a leafy ravine to the water's edge—a forest pond set in the gorgeous foliage of ripening maples.
“I don't see,” said Sylvia impatiently, “how we are going to obey instructions and go straight ahead. There must be a stupid boat somewhere!”
But the game-laden keeper shook his head, pulled up his hip boots, and pointed out a line of alder poles set in the water to mark a crossing.
“Am I expected to wade?” asked the girl anxiously.
“This here,” observed the keeper, “is one of the most sportin' courses on the estate. Last season I seen Miss Page go through it like a scared deer—the young lady, sir, that took last season's cup”—in explanation to Siward, who stood doubtfully at the water's edge, looking back at Sylvia.
Raising her dismayed eyes she encountered his; there was a little laugh between them. She stepped daintily across the stones to the water's edge, instinctively gathering her kilts in one hand.