looking over the wood pile to see if she had fallen behind it, but she
hadn't."

"It is only a few days since her father died," said the senior of the
party gravely.

"And so," went on the young man, "she has very properly given these few
days to inconsolable grief. But now our visit is just timed to comfort
and enliven her, _why_ is she not here to be comforted and enlivened?"

No-one answered, and, as the speaker was slowly making his way toward
the frying-pan, no one seemed really apprehensive that he would keep
them waiting. The youth had an oval, almost childish face; his skin was
dark, clear, and softly coloured as any girl's; his hair fell in black,
loose curls over his forehead. He was tall, slender without being thin,
very supple; but his languid attitudes fell short of grace, and were
only tolerable because they were comic. When he reached out his hand for
the handle of the frying-pan he held the attention of the whole company
by virtue of his office, and his mind, to Bates's annoyance, was still
running on the girl.

"Is she fond of going out walking alone?" he asked.

"How could she be fond of walking when there's no place to walk?" Bates
spoke roughly. "Besides, she has too much work to do."

"Ever lost her before?"

"No," said Bates. It would have been perfectly unbearable to his pride
that these strangers should guess his real uneasiness or its cause, so