"I'm sorry I frightened you out of your favorite stamping
ground," he said rather aimlessly.

"You didn't frighten me," she retorted, with a touch of fire.
"I'm not a silly seminary girl. I've taken care of myself for a
long time now, and I've done it without being frightened. We
were together two Sundays, and I'm sure I wasn't frightened of
Bob, or you. It isn't that. I have no fears of taking care of
myself, but the world insists on taking care of one as well.
That's the trouble. It's what the world would have to say about
me and my employer meeting regularly and riding in the hills on
Sundays. It's funny, but it's so. I could ride with one of the
clerks without remark, but with you--no."

"But the world don't know and don't need to know," he cried.

"Which makes it worse, in a way, feeling guilty of nothing and
yet sneaking around back-roads with all the feeling of doing
something wrong. It would be finer and braver for me
publicly..."

"To go to lunch with me on a week-day," Daylight said, divining
the drift of her uncompleted argument.

She nodded.

"I didn't have that quite in mind, but it will do. I'd prefer
doing the brazen thing and having everybody know it, to doing the
furtive thing and being found out. Not that I'm asking to be
invited to lunch," she added, with a smile; "but I'm sure you