steps with that slow reflectiveness which comes when one walks backwards
and forwards over the same ground.

There is something eminently conversational in the practice of walking
to and fro. For that purpose it is better than an arm-chair and a pipe,
or a piece of knitting.

Occasionally Vellacott dropped a pace behind, apparently with a purpose;
for when he did so he raised his eyes instantly. He seemed to be slowly
detailing the maiden, and he frowned a little. She was exactly what she
had promised to be. The singularly golden hair which he had last seen
flowing freely over her slight young shoulders had acquired a
decorousness of curve, although the hue was unchanged. The shoulders
were exactly the same in contour, on a slightly larger scale; and the
manner of carrying her head--a manner peculiarly her own, and suggestive
of a certain gentle wilfulness--was unaltered.

And yet there was a change: that subtle change which seems to come to
girls suddenly, in the space of a week--of one night. And this man was
watching her with his analytical eyes, wondering what the change might
be.

He was more or less a bookworm, and he possibly thought that this
subject--this pleasant young subject walking beside him in a blue cotton
dress--was one which might easily be grasped and understood if only one
gave one's mind to it. Hence the little frown. It denoted the gift of
his mind. It was the frown that settled over his eyes when he cut the
pages of a deep book and glanced at the point of his pencil.

He had read many books, and he knew a number of things. But there is one