“My boy, you've got to do it. You ain't going to lie down here, are you? And that's what it means if you don't. There's your train waiting there. You get right aboard before anybody shows up to ask questions. Good-by; good luck to you.”
Halloran got aboard, moody still; pulled up his collar, pulled down his hat, slid down low in the seat, and fixed his eyes on a worn spot in the back of the seat ahead. And when the train pulled into Reed City he was still gazing at the worn spot.
The invigorating autumn air still held in Woodland Valley. Halloran, finding that the sleepy white horses and their driver were likely to be delayed in the village, threw his bag under a seat and set out on foot, following the road up through the notch by the bronze patches of cornstalks. He caught up a handful of young winter-green and munched it as he tramped. There was a lift in the air, and he threw open his coat and walked with a swing.
At the house he asked for Miss Davies and was told that she was in her room, so he wrote a line in the library and gave it to a maid to take to her.
She came in a moment.
“Get your things, Margaret,” he said; “let's go outside.”
“But—when did you come?”
“Just now. I walked up. I've been out to Wauchung since I saw you the other day, but there was no use trying to stay there. You see—what I said about being down here on business was all a fib—I was afraid to own up.”
“Afraid,” she stood looking at him, with such a peculiar expression that he feared another delay.
“Never mind now; I'll tell you all about it when we get out. I want to walk up to the blackberry patch where I saw you the first day.” She went without a word for her things, still with that odd, sober expression; and in a few moments they were walking up the path toward the lower slopes of the mountain.