Page:Stanwood Pier--The ancient grudge.djvu/414

Rh dow and looking out at a small catboat that was careening on the farther side of the lake. "Papa and his new toy," she explained. "He's perfectly daft over it; the only way we ever get him ashore is by going out and screaming at him through the megaphone. Mamma's out driving, so you and I will have to drink our tea by ourselves."

He suggested, when this ceremony had been finished, that she show him the garden.

"It's only the tag end of it," she said; "it's hardly worth seeing. It was pretty a month ago."

They walked together along the box-bordered paths; in the centre he paused to read the motto on the sun-dial, "I know none but sunny hours."

Then he said abruptly,—

"Is there a train for New York to-night?"

"Good gracious," she cried, "what a question! What's the matter with your room? Are you mad? either kind of mad—angry or insane—which?"

"I may have to go back to-night," he answered. "Very likely you don't know, but I left things at the works in rather an unsettled state; I don't like to be away. I came on to see you—to talk with you for about an hour, maybe—and then go back."

He looked for a moment in grave silence at her face. It had perhaps a little less color now than when she had left the house, but she showed no sign of emotion, hardly even surprise. As she waited for him to speak, she stood with the clear-eyed look of an interested young boy, erect, motionless, with her hands thrust into the pockets of her long coat.

"It's a pretty intimate unbosoming of myself that I've got to ask you to listen to," Floyd said. "I'm likely to make a mess of it however I begin, so I'll start right off by saying that I've been for a good while dissatisfied with my life, and never so much so as this summer. We'll omit the business situation; that is n't what I mean. But