for instance, of telling them at the Hall that I've seen you."

The daylight was flooding up from the North-West, now, in a great stream
that had flushed the whole landscape with colour; and I could see the full
significance of honest inquiry in my companion's face as he probed me with
his stare. But I could meet his gaze without confusion. My purpose was
single enough, and if I had had a moment's doubt of him when he failed to
respond to my mood of fantasy; I was now fully prepared to accept him
without qualification.

He was not like his sister in appearance. He favoured the paternal stock,
I inferred. He was blue-eyed and fairer than Anne, and the tan of his face
was red where hers was dusky. Nevertheless, I saw a likeness between them
deeper than some family trick of expression which, now and again, made me
feel their kinship. For Banks, too, gave me the impression of having a
soul that came something nearer the surface of life than is common in
average humanity--a look of vitality, zest, ardour--I fumbled for a more
significant superlative as I returned his stare. And yet behind that
ardour there was, in Arthur Banks, at least, a hint of determination and
shrewdness that I felt must be inherited from the sound yeoman stock of
his father.

Our pause of mutual investigation ended in a smile. He held out his hand
with a pleasant frankness that somehow proclaimed the added colonial
quality of him.

"That's all right," he said, "but anyway I couldn't give you any
confidences, yet. I don't know myself, you see."

"Are you going back to the Hall?" I asked.