She came slowly forward through the rosy evening light, straight and slim in her girlish gown of white, unrelieved except by a touch or two of black, and by the coppery splendor of her hair.
She halted in the path a little way from the arbor, evidently aware that somebody was within.
"Are you there, Monsieur Warner?" she asked in her sweet, childish voice.
He got up with a glance of resignation at Halkett, and went to meet her. Halkett, from the arbor, noticed the expression of her face when Warner appeared, and he continued to observe the girl with curious attention.
She had instinctively laid her hands in Warner's, detaining him naïvely, and looking up into his face with an honesty too transparent to mistake.
"I miss you very much," she said, "even for a few minutes. I hastened my toilet to rejoin you."
"That is very sweet of you, Philippa——" He didn't know what else to say; felt the embarrassment warm on his face—chagrin, shyness, something of both, perhaps—and a rather helpless feeling that he was acquiescing in an understanding which already was making him very uneasy.
"Come in to the arbor," he said. "Mr. Halkett is there."
She slipped her arm through his. Halkett saw both their faces as they approached, and, watching Warner for a moment, he felt inclined to laugh. But in this young girl's eyes there was something that checked his amusement. A man does not laugh at the happy and serious eyes of childhood.
So he rose and paid his respects to Philippa with pleasant formality; she seated herself between the two men.