k and breaking his word. Wilbraham ought
to sack him. I promise you when I've a girl I'll keep her in line, and
if she turns nasty, I'll get another."

Rickie smiled and said no more. But he was sorry that any one should
start life with such a creed--all the more sorry because the creed
caricatured his own. He too believed that life should be in a line--a
line of enormous length, full of countless interests and countless
figures, all well beloved. But woman was not to be "kept" to this line.
Rather did she advance it continually, like some triumphant general,
making each unit still more interesting, still more lovable, than it had
been before. He loved Agnes, not only for herself, but because she was
lighting up the human world. But he could scarcely explain this to an
inexperienced animal, nor did he make the attempt.

For a long time they proceeded in silence. The hill behind Cadover
was in harvest, and the horses moved regretfully between the sheaves.
Stephen had picked a grass leaf, and was blowing catcalls upon it. He
blew very well, and this morning all his soul went into the wail. For he
was ill. He was tortured with the feeling that he could not get away
and do--do something, instead of being civil to this anaemic prig. Four
hours in the rain was better than this: he had not wanted to fidget in
the rain. But now the air was like wine, and the stubble was smelling of
wet, and over his head white clouds trundled more slowly and more seldom
through broadening tracts of blue. There never had been such a morning,
and he shut up his eyes and called to it. And whenever he called, Rickie
shut up his eyes and winced.

At last the blade broke. "We don't go quick, do we" he remarked, and
looked on the weedy track for another.

"I wish you wouldn't let me keep you. If you were alone you would be
galloping or something of that sort."

"I was told I must go your pace," he said mournfully. "And you promised
Miss Pembroke not to hurry."

"Well, I'll disobey." But he could not rise above a gentle trot, and
even that nearly jerked him out of the saddle.

"Sit like this," said Stephen. "Can't you see like this?" Rickie lurched
forward, and broke his thumb nail on the horse's neck. It bled a little,
and had to be bound up.

"Thank you--awfully kind--no tighter, please--I'm simply spoiling your
day."

"I can't think how a man can help riding. You've only to leave it to the
horse so!--so!--just as you leave it to water in