id--a
discreetly and soothingly frank French woman. Too late to telephone
him, she had overruled her longing to see him and had decided that at
what she hoped was his "critical stage" it would be wiser not to show
herself to him thus even in her most becoming tea-gown, which compelled
the eyes of the beholder to a fascinating game of hide and seek with
her neck and arms and the lines of her figure.

"And Mrs. Dumont?" inquired Scarborough of the servant who brought
Gladys' message and note.

"She's out walking, sir."

Scarborough rode away, taking the long drive through the grounds of the
Eyrie, as it would save him a mile of dusty and not well-shaded
highway. A few hundred yards and he was passing the sloping meadows
that lay golden bronze in the sun, beyond the narrow fringe of wood
skirting and shielding the drive. The grass and clover had been cut.
Part of it was spread where it had fallen, part had been raked into
little hillocks ready for the wagons. At the edge of one of these
hillocks far down the slope he saw the tail of a pale blue skirt, a
white parasol cast upon the stubble beside it. He reined in his horse,
hesitated, dismounted, tied his bridle round a sapling. He strode
across the field toward the hillock that had betrayed its secret to him.

"Do I interrupt?" he called when he was still far enough away not to be
taking her by surprise.

There was no answer. He paused, debating whether to call again or to
turn back.

But soon she was rising--the lower part of her tall narrow figure hid
by the hillock, the upper part revealing to him the strong stamp of
that vivid individuality of hers which separated her at once from no
matter what company. She had on a big garden hat, trimmed just a
little with summer flowers, a blouse of some soft white material, with
even softer lace on the shoulders and in the long, loose sleeves. She
gave a friendly nod and glance in his direction, and said: "Oh,
no--not at all. I'm glad to have help in enjoying this."

She was looking out toward the mists of the horizon hills. The heat of
the day had passed; the woods, the hillocks of hay were casting long
shadows on the pale-bronze fields. A breeze had sprung up and was
lifting from the dried and drying grass and clover a keen, sweet,
intoxicating perfume--like the odor which classic zephyrs used to shake
from the flowing hair of woodland nymphs.

He stood beside her without speaking, looking intently at her.