rg back yard, quite definite and
limited in its outlines.

"What will you do up there?" she whispered.

Seth turned half around on the bench, striving to see
her face in the darkness. He thought her infinitely
more sensible and straightforward than George Willard,
and was glad he had come away from his friend. A
feeling of impatience with the town that had been in
his mind returned, and he tried to tell her of it.
"Everyone talks and talks," he began. "I'm sick of it.
I'll do something, get into some kind of work where
talk don't count. Maybe I'll just be a mechanic in a
shop. I don't know. I guess I don't care much. I just
want to work and keep quiet. That's all I've got in my
mind."

Seth arose from the bench and put out his hand. He did
not want to bring the meeting to an end but could not
think of anything more to say. "It's the last time
we'll see each other," he whispered.

A wave of sentiment swept over Helen. Putting her hand
upon Seth's shoulder, she started to draw his face down
toward her own upturned face. The act was one of pure
affection and cutting regret that some vague adventure
that had been present in the spirit of the night would
now never be realized. "I think I'd better be going
along," she said, letting her hand fall heavily to her
side. A thought came to her. "Don't you go with me; I
want to be alone," she said. "You go and talk with your
mother. You'd better do that now."

Seth hesitated and, as he stood waiting, the girl
turned and ran away through the hedge. A desire to run
after her came to him, but he only stood staring,
perplexed and puzzled by her action as he had been
perplexed and puzzled by all of the life of the town
out of which she had come. Walking slowly toward the
house, he stopped in the shadow of a large tree and
looked at his mother sitting by a lighted window busily
sewing. The feeling of loneliness that had visited him
earlier in the evening returned and colored his
thoughts of the adventure through which he had just
passed. "Huh!" he exclaimed, turning and staring in the
direction taken by Helen White. "That's how things'll
turn out. She'll be like the rest. I suppose she'll
begin now to look at me in a funny way." He looked at
the ground and pondered this thought. "She'll be
embarrassed and feel strange when I'm around," he
whispered to himself. "That's how it'll be. That's how
everything'll turn out. When it comes to loving
someone, it won't never be me. It