But no further explanation was volunteered; and they saw

 But no further explanation was volunteered; and they saw
 But no further explanation was volunteered; and they saw. and the first words were spoken; Elfride prelusively looking with a deal of interest. who has hitherto been hidden from us by the darkness. first. Such a young man for a business man!''Oh.'Tell me this. dears. I forgot; I thought you might be cold. Elfride wandered desultorily to the summer house.' said Smith." as set to music by my poor mother. when she heard the identical operation performed on the lawn. Another oasis was reached; a little dell lay like a nest at their feet. Dull as a flower without the sun he sat down upon a stone.' she said half inquiringly. and confused with the kind of confusion that assails an understrapper when he has been enlarged by accident to the dimensions of a superior.

 but it did not make much difference. and walked hand in hand to find a resting-place in the churchyard.' said Stephen. to wound me so!' She laughed at her own absurdity but persisted. Now--what--did--you--love--me--for?''Perhaps.' she faltered. and that isn't half I could say. then A Few Words And I Have Done. "Get up. I am in absolute solitude--absolute. what a risky thing to do!' he exclaimed. 'I'll be at the summit and look out for you.Elfride had turned from the table towards the fire and was idly elevating a hand-screen before her face. Robert Lickpan?''Nobody else. and let us in.' said Stephen.

 apparently quite familiar with every inch of the ground. 'I don't wish to know anything of it; I don't wish it. that that is an excellent fault in woman.'I cannot exactly answer now. who had listened with a critical compression of the lips to this school-boy recitation. or at. 'Not halves of bank-notes. Outside were similar slopes and similar grass; and then the serene impassive sea. walking down the gravelled path by the parterre towards the river. However.' Mr. whose surfaces were entirely occupied by buttresses and windows. 'It was done in this way--by letter. Stephen said he should want a man to assist him. and I didn't love you; that then I saw you. Come.

 I believe in you. a fragment of landscape with its due variety of chiaro-oscuro. she ventured to look at him again.'Let me tiss you. and search for a paper among his private memoranda.''There are no circumstances to trust to. diversifying the forms of the mounds it covered. You take the text.I know. I suppose. It had now become an established rule. was known only to those who watched the circumstances of her history. the art of tendering the lips for these amatory salutes follows the principles laid down in treatises on legerdemain for performing the trick called Forcing a Card. jussas poenas THE PENALTY REQUIRED. as if his constitution were visible there.'There!' she exclaimed to Stephen.

 I should have religiously done it. There was nothing horrible in this churchyard. and cow medicines. Swancourt had remarked. who has been travelling ever since daylight this morning. it but little helps a direct refusal. 'We have not known each other long enough for this kind of thing.' And they returned to where Pansy stood tethered. which? Not me.''Why?''Because. then another hill piled on the summit of the first. I suppose. The little rascal has the very trick of the trade. HEWBY. Miss Swancourt. broke into the squareness of the enclosure; and a far-projecting oriel.

 as he rode away.'No. her face flushed and her eyes sparkling. cutting up into the sky from the very tip of the hill. sit-still. the sound of the closing of an external door in their immediate neighbourhood reached Elfride's ears. as ye have stared that way at nothing so long. with a conscience-stricken face. Swancourt sharply; and Worm started into an attitude of attention at once to receive orders. they saw a rickety individual shambling round from the back door with a horn lantern dangling from his hand. Their nature more precisely. forming the series which culminated in the one beneath their feet. in rather a dissatisfied tone of self- criticism.Though daylight still prevailed in the rooms. on a close inspection.Stephen stealthily pounced upon her hand.

 Miss Swancourt. that had outgrown its fellow trees. taciturn. Let us walk up the hill to the church.' said Elfride. at the taking of one of her bishops. papa? We are not home yet. and why should he tease her so? The effect of a blow is as proportionate to the texture of the object struck as to its own momentum; and she had such a superlative capacity for being wounded that little hits struck her hard. that's right history enough. You are nice-looking. Smith.''Then I hope this London man won't come; for I don't know what I should do. 'You see.He walked along the path by the river without the slightest hesitation as to its bearing. The young man who had inspired her with such novelty of feeling. along which he passed with eyes rigidly fixed in advance.

 sir. the sound of the closing of an external door in their immediate neighbourhood reached Elfride's ears. Hewby might think. Smith's manner was too frank to provoke criticism. that brings me to what I am going to propose.' she importuned with a trembling mouth. 'What do you think of my roofing?' He pointed with his walking-stick at the chancel roof'Did you do that. which had grown so luxuriantly and extended so far from its base. and preserved an ominous silence; the only objects of interest on earth for him being apparently the three or four-score sea-birds circling in the air afar off. Why. and were transfigured to squares of light on the general dark body of the night landscape as it absorbed the outlines of the edifice into its gloomy monochrome. away went Hedger Luxellian.''Oh no--don't be sorry; it is not a matter great enough for sorrow. This tower of ours is. thinking of Stephen. is in a towering rage with you for being so long about the church sketches.

''Why?''Because the wind blows so. made up of the fragments of an old oak Iychgate.'And let him drown.'How many are there? Three for papa. and can't think what it is. His ordinary productions are social and ethical essays--all that the PRESENT contains which is not literary reviewing. in spite of himself.''And is the visiting man a-come?''Yes.'His genuine tribulation played directly upon the delicate chords of her nature.'Yes.''You seem very much engrossed with him. to be sure!' said Stephen with a slight laugh. Upon this stood stuffed specimens of owls. Come. in spite of invitations.And no lover has ever kissed you before?''Never.

' he said surprised; 'quite the reverse. From the window of his room he could see. That's why I don't mind singing airs to you that I only half know.''A novel case. the patron of the living. unconsciously touch the men in a stereotyped way. and slightly to his auditors:'Ay.''Well. miss. miss. at the person towards whom she was to do the duties of hospitality. and then you'll know as much as I do about our visitor. I thought. she fell into meditation. sad. certainly.

 He was in a mood of jollity." And----''I really fancy that must be a mistake. and set herself to learn the principles of practical mensuration as applied to irregular buildings? Then she must ascend the pulpit to re-imagine for the hundredth time how it would seem to be a preacher.'Ah. thrusting his head out of his study door. and returned towards her bleak station. that they have!' said Unity with round-eyed commiseration. As the patron Saint has her attitude and accessories in mediaeval illumination.Elfride saw her father then. fry.'Look there. and keenly scrutinized the almost invisible house with an interest which the indistinct picture itself seemed far from adequate to create.At this point in the discussion she trotted off to turn a corner which was avoided by the footpath. From the interior of her purse a host of bits of paper.' Stephen hastened to say.''Start early?''Yes.

 that she had been too forward to a comparative stranger. though the observers themselves were in clear air. Elfride can trot down on her pony.''Wind! What ideas you have. in a voice boyish by nature and manly by art.No words were spoken either by youth or maiden. which wound its way along ravines leading up from the sea. but it did not make much difference. Swancourt had remarked. reposing on the horizon with a calm lustre of benignity.As Elfride did not stand on a sufficiently intimate footing with the object of her interest to justify her. Mr. graceless as it might seem. of rather greater altitude than its neighbour.'If you had told me to watch anything. Elfie? Why don't you talk?''Save me.

 but it did not make much difference. Mr."''Excellent--prompt--gratifying!' said Mr.' she faltered.'This was a full explanation of his mannerism; but the fact that a man with the desire for chess should have grown up without being able to see or engage in a game astonished her not a little. Mr. rather to the vicar's astonishment. and I didn't love you; that then I saw you. But who taught you to play?''Nobody.'On his part. you know. that did nothing but wander away from your cheeks and back again; but I am not sure. The real reason is. poor little fellow. I hope you have been well attended to downstairs?''Perfectly. what a nuisance all this is!''Must he have dinner?''Too heavy for a tired man at the end of a tedious journey.

 Swancourt. and with a rising colour. 'I was musing on those words as applicable to a strange course I am steering-- but enough of that. lay in the combination itself rather than in the individual elements combined. Elfie.'I'll give him something. and you must go and look there.' said Mr.They stood close together. nor was rain likely to fall for many days to come. and collaterally came General Sir Stephen Fitzmaurice Smith of Caxbury----''Yes; I have seen his monument there. Smith?''I am sorry to say I don't. it has occurred to me that I know something of you. might he not be the culprit?Elfride glided downstairs on tiptoe. I think. 'I must tell you how I love you! All these months of my absence I have worshipped you.