Page:E Nesbit - The Literary Sense.djvu/130

118 "There is no one like you," he said as they passed the stile above the wood; "no one in this beautiful world."

Her heart replied—

"If there is anyone like you I have never met him, and oh, thank God, thank God, that I have met you now."

Aloud she said—

"There's a place under beech trees—a sort of chalk plateau—I used to have picnics there with my brothers when I was a little girl—"

"Shall we go there?" he asked. "Will you really take me to the place that your pretty memories haunt? Ah—how good you are to me."

As they went down the steep wood-path she slipped, stumbled—he caught her.

"Give me your hand!" he said. "This path's not safe for you."

It was not. She gave him her hand, and they went down into the wood together.

The picnic was gay as an August garden. After a life of repression—to meet someone to whom one might be oneself! It was very good.

She said so. That was when he did kiss her hand.