suppose?" in a matter-of-fact tone. "A pleasure we hardly expected! Let
me see. I haven't seen you since--ah, when was it?"

He told her. "Yes; I remember now. Wasn't that the day the Scotch
bagpipes went by? You had business that called you away. Something very
important, was it not? You were successful?"

"Quite."

"How oddly you say that!" She looked at him curiously. "But shall we
walk on toward the house? I went down into the town thinking to meet my
uncle," she explained, "but as I had a few errands, on account of a
children's fête we are planning, reached the tavern after he had gone."

"He went to a farm not far distant."

As he spoke, she stepped into the path leading from the churchyard; it
was narrow and she walked before him.

"Yes; so the landlord said," she remarked without looking around. And
then, irrelevantly, "The others went hunting. Are you a Nimrod, Mr.
Steele?"

"Not a mighty one."

"Oh, you wouldn't have to be that--for rabbits!"

She shot a glance over her shoulder; her eyes were glad; but to the man
they were bright merely with the joy of youth that drops glances like
sunshine for all alike. Perhaps he would have found pleasure in thinking