hard that you should cut me--oh, I can see by your face that you mean
to do it!--that you should regard me as a kind of enemy because--"

The usually fluent Stafford stopped helplessly as the beautiful eyes
turned slowly upon him with a slight look of wonder in them.

"Why should you mind?" she said, with almost childish innocence. "You
do not know me; we only met yesterday--we are not friends--Oh I am not
forgetting your kindness last night; oh, no!--but what can it matter to
you?"

In another woman Stafford would have suspected the question of
coquetry, of a desire to fish for the inevitable response; but looking
in those clear, guileless eyes, he could not entertain any such
suspicion.

"I beg your pardon; but it does matter very much," he retorted. "In the
first place, a man does not like being cut by a lady; and in the next,
we shall be neighbours--I'm going to stay there--" he nodded grimly at
the beautiful "little place."

"Neighbours?" she said, half absently. "It is farther off than you
think; and, besides, we know no one. We have no neighbours in that
sense--or friends. My father does not like to see anyone; we live quite
alone--"

"So I've heard--" He stopped and bit his lip; but she did not seem to
have noticed his interruption.

--"So that even if my father did not object to the house or--or--"

"My father," said Stafford with a smile.

A smile answered his candour.

"It would be all the same. And why should it matter to you? You have a
great many friends, no doubt--and we should not be likely to meet."

"Oh, yes, we should!" he said, with the dogged kind of insistence which
also sometimes surprised his friends. "I was going to avail myself of
your permission, and fish the stream--but, of course, I can't do that
now."

"No--I suppose not," she assented. "But we should be sure to meet on
the road--I should be riding--walking."

"But not on this side often," she argued.

A faint, very faint colour had stolen into the clear pallor of her
cheek, her eyes were downcast. She was honestly surprised, and, yes, a
little pleased that he should protest against the close of their
acquaintance; pleased, though why, she could not have told; for it did
not seem to matter.

"Oh, yes, I should," he retorted. "It's very pretty this side, and--See
here, Miss Heron." He drew a little nearer and looked up at her with
something like a frown in his eagerness. "Of course I shall speak to my
father about--well,