I reached the fence and climbed up two bars of it, and leaning
over I looked this way and that for my twin-souled partner of the
morning. It was not long before I caught sight of her, only a
short distance away. Her back was towards me and--well, one can
never foresee exactly how one will find things--she was talking
to a Boy.

Of course there are boys and boys, and Lord knows I was never
narrow. But this was the parson's son from an adjoining village,
a red-headed boy and as common a little beast as ever stepped.
He cultivated ferrets--his only good point; and it was evidently
through the medium of this art that he was basely supplanting me,
for her head was bent absorbedly over something he carried in his
hands. With some trepidation I called out, "Hi!" But answer
there was none. Then again I called, "Hi!" but this time with a
sickening sense of failure and of doom. She replied only by a
complex gesture, decisive in import if not easily described. A
petulant toss of the head, a jerk of the left shoulder, and a
backward kick of the left foot, all delivered at once--that was
all, and that was enough. The red-headed boy never even
condescended to glance my way. Why, indeed, should he? I
dropped from the fence without another effort, and took my way
homewards along the weary road.

Little inclination was left to me, at first, for any solitary
visit to my accustomed palace, the pleasures of which I had so
recently tasted in company; and yet after a minute or two I found
myself, from habit, sneaking off there much as usual. Presently
I became aware of a certain solace and consolation in my
newly-recovered independence of action. Quit of all female whims