“Really?” I asked.
“Really, yes. I won’t have a chance again for–oh, never, maybe.”
“Then of course I’ll go ahead.” I stepped over the brook, out of sight. A moment later I heard a soft splashing of the water, and a voice called, “I’m only six now. Oh, it’s such fun–and so cold!”
I made no reply. In fancy I could see her white feet in the water, her face tipped up in the shadows, her eyes large with delight. How sweet she was, how desirable! I stood lost in a rosy reverie, when suddenly I felt her beside me, and turned to meet her smile.
“How you like the brook,” I said.
“How I love it!” she exclaimed. “Don’t think me silly, but it really says secret things to me.”
“Such secrets as the stream told to Rossetti?” I asked.
She looked away. “I said secret things,” she answered.
We moved on, around the bend by the road where the little picture of far hills came into view, and back into the dusk of the thickest pines. At the second crossing of the brook, I took her hand to steady her over the slippery stones, and when we were across, the mood and memories of the place had their way with us, and our hands did not unclasp. We walked on so together to the spot where we first had met, and where first the thrush had sounded for us his elfin clarion. There we stopped and listened, but there was no sound save the whisper of the pines.
“The pines sound like soft midnight surf on the shore,” she whispered.