"Hadn't thought," replied Orde.

"Don't you ever indulge in vain and idle speculations?" she
inquired. "Never mind, don't answer. It's too much to expect of a
man."

She set herself in idle motion down the slope, swinging the hat at
the end of its veil, pausing to look or listen, humming a little
melody between her closed lips, throwing her head back to breathe
deep the warm air, revelling in the woods sounds and woods odours
and woods life with entire self-abandonment. Orde followed her in
silence. She seemed to be quite without responsibility in regard to
him; and yet an occasional random remark thrown in his direction
proved that he was not forgotten. Finally they emerged from the
beach woods.

They faced an open rolling country. As far as the eye could reach
were the old stumps of pine trees. Sometimes they stood in place,
burned and scarred, but attesting mutely the abiding place of a
spirit long since passed away. Sometimes they had been uprooted and
dragged to mark the boundaries of fields, where they raised an
abatis of twisted roots to the sky.

The girl stopped short as she came face to face with this open
country. The inner uplift, that had lent to her aspect the wide-
eyed, careless joy of a child, faded. In its place came a new and
serious gravity. She turned on him troubled eyes.

"You do this," she accused him quite simply.