Page:Harvey O'Higgins--Don-a-dreams.djvu/112

 "I'm sure—yes, of course. Why not?" He suggested, in as matter-of-fact a tone as possible: "If you wrote to him, telling him where you are, he'll ask me to go with him . . . I think."

The quick glance she gave him, archly, accepted the small deception which the plan implied. "Well," she agreed.

They walked in a guiltily-smiling silence until they came to the side gate of the college grounds. Their agreement required that Conroy should not see them together. Don said: "He's in Residence, you know," and nodded toward the building.

She turned quickly. "I mustn't go any further. I've been away so long already."

"That's so," he said. "Let's go back by the avenue."

It was the longest way round.

As soon as the college was out of sight in the trees, the hush of their small conspiracy lifted again, and they went along with their chatter, stepping out against a wind that was sifting the snow down on them from the branches overhead. He asked her whether she was cold—because the question gave him an excuse for looking at her with a lingering apprehension. She replied that she was not, but tried to turn up her collar to show him a woman's appreciation of his thought of her comfort. And when the collar came up awkwardly, she let him help her with it, and pretended not to notice the reverent timidity with which he did it.

"Aren't you too?" she asked. "Turn yours