She put her head on his shoulder, and Mr. Truefitt, getting a better grip with his arm, drew her toward him.
"Think it over," he whispered, and bent and kissed her.
"Never," was the reply.
Mr. Truefitt kissed her again, and was about to repeat the performance when she started up with a faint scream, and, pushing him away, darted from the summer-house and fled up the garden. Mr. Truefitt, red with wrath, stood his ground and stared ferociously at the shrunken figure of Captain Sellers standing behind the little gate in the fence that gave on to the foreshore. The captain, with a cheery smile, lifted the latch and entered the garden.
"I picked a little bunch o' flowers for Miss Willett," he said, advancing and placing them on the table.
"Who told you to come into my garden?" shouted the angry Mr. Truefitt.
"Yes, all of 'em," said Captain Sellers, taking up the bunch and looking at them. "Smell!"
He thrust the bunch into the other's face, and withdrawing it plunged his own face into it with rapturous sniffs. Mr. Truefitt, his nose decorated with pollen ravished from a huge lily, eyed him murderously.
"Get out of my garden," he said, with an imperious wave of his hand.
"I can't hear what you say," said the captain, following the direction of the other's hand and stepping outside. "Sometimes I think my deafness gets worse. It's a great deprivation.''