sped her hands.

"Oh yes! I simply love riding. But there's Jolly's horse; why don't you
ride him? Here he is. We could go after tea."

Val looked doubtfully at his trousered legs.

He had imagined them immaculate before her eyes in high brown boots and
Bedford cords.

"I don't much like riding his horse," he said. "He mightn't like it.
Besides, Uncle Soames wants to get back, I expect. Not that I believe
in buckling under to him, you know. You haven't got an uncle, have you?
This is rather a good beast," he added, scrutinising Jolly's horse, a
dark brown, which was showing the whites of its eyes. "You haven't got
any hunting here, I suppose?"

"No; I don't know that I want to hunt. It must be awfully exciting, of
course; but it's cruel, isn't it? June says so."

"Cruel?" ejaculated Val. "Oh! that's all rot. Who's June?"

"My sister--my half-sister, you know--much older than me." She had put
her hands up to both cheeks of Jolly's horse, and was rubbing her nose
against its nose with a gentle snuffling noise which seemed to have
an hypnotic effect on the animal. Val contemplated her cheek resting
against the horse's nose, and her eyes gleaming round at him. 'She's
really a duck,' he thought.

They returned to the house less talkative, followed this time by the
dog Balthasar, walking more slowly than anything on earth, and clearly
expecting them not to exceed his speed limit.

"This is a ripping place," said Val from under the oak tree, where they
had paused to allow the dog Balthasar to come up.

"Yes," said Holly, and sighed. "Of course I want to go everywhere. I
wish I were a gipsy."

"Yes, gipsies are jolly," replied Val, with a conviction which had just
come to him; "you're rather like one, you know."

Holly's face shone suddenly and deeply, like dark leaves gilded by the
sun.

"To go mad-rabbiting everywhere and see everything, and live in the
open--oh! wouldn't it be fun?"

"Let's do it!" said Val.

"Oh yes, let's!"

"It'd be grand sport, just you and I."

Then Holly perceived the quaintness and gushed.

"Well, we've got to do it," said Val obstinately, but reddening too.

"I believe in doing things you want to do. What's down there?"

"The kitchen-garden, and the pond and the coppice, and the farm."

"Let's go down!"

Holly glanced back at the house.

"It's tea-time, I expect; there's Dad beckoning."

Val, uttering a growly sound, followed her towards the house.

When they re-enter