r understanding her soul lay close to his; she had him all to
herself. But he must be made abstract first.

Then, if she put her arm in his, it caused him almost torture. His
consciousness seemed to split. The place where she was touching him ran
hot with friction. He was one internecine battle, and he became cruel to
her because of it.

One evening in midsummer Miriam called at the house, warm from climbing.
Paul was alone in the kitchen; his mother could be heard moving about
upstairs.

"Come and look at the sweet-peas," he said to the girl.

They went into the garden. The sky behind the townlet and the church was
orange-red; the flower-garden was flooded with a strange warm light that
lifted every leaf into significance. Paul passed along a fine row of
sweet-peas, gathering a blossom here and there, all cream and pale blue.
Miriam followed, breathing the fragrance. To her, flowers appealed with
such strength she felt she must make them part of herself. When she bent
and breathed a flower, it was as if she and the flower were loving each
other. Paul hated her for it. There seemed a sort of exposure about the
action, something too intimate.

When he had got a fair bunch, they returned to the house. He listened
for a moment to his mother's quiet movement upstairs, then he said:

"Come here, and let me pin them in for you." He arranged them two or
three at a time in the bosom of her dress, stepping back now and then to
see the effect. "You know," he said, taking the pin out of his mouth, "a
woman ought always to arrange her flowers before her glass."

Miriam laughed. She thought flowers ought to be pinned in one's dress
without any care. That Paul should take pains to fix her flowers for her
was his whim.

He was rather offended at her laughter.

"Some women do--those who look decent," he said.

Miriam laughed again, but mirthlessly, to hear him thus mix her up with
women in a general way. From most men she would have ignored it. But
from him it hurt her.

He had nearly finished arranging the flowers when he heard his mother's
footstep on the stairs. Hurriedly he pushed in the last pin and turned
away.

"Don't let mater know," he said.

Miriam picked up her books and stood in the doorway looking with chagrin
at the beautiful sunset. She would call for Paul no more, she said.

"Good-evening, Mrs. Morel," she said, in a deferential way. She sounded
as if she felt she had no right to be there.

"Oh, is