"Good-by--good-by--I must run!"

But his long arms only clasped her the closer.

"Hermione, when will you be my wife?"

"Oh, please, please let me go; if I'm late--"

"When, Hermione?"

"When I--come home, if--you really--want me--Oh, now my hair's all
coming down, I know. Good-by!"

Reluctantly he loosed her and stood to watch until, reaching the
verandah of the house, she paused to glance back to where he stood among
the leaves ere she vanished between the screen doors. Then Ravenslee
turned, and remembering her sudden fright, looked sharply about him,
even pausing, now and then, to peer behind bush and thicket; but this
time he did not think to glance upward, and thus failed to see the round
eyes that watched him from amid the leaves of the great tree.

So he came again to the dusty highway and strode along, throbbing with
life and the lust of life, revelling in the glory of earth and sky and
quite unconscious of the small, furtive figure that flitted after him
far behind.

And it was not until he sat in the ferryboat that he remembered he had
forgotten to give her the ring, after all.