Vane strolled on along the terrace thoughtfully. He was not offended; he
understood his companion's attitude. Like other men of education and good
upbringing driven by unrest or disaster to the untrammeled life of the
bush, Carroll had gained sympathy as well as knowledge. Facing facts
candidly, he seldom indulged in decided protest against any of them. On
the other hand, Vane was on occasion liable to outbreaks of indignation.

"Well," said Vane at length, "I guess it's time to go to bed."




CHAPTER VI

UPON THE HEIGHTS


Vane rose early the next morning, as he had been accustomed to do, and
taking a towel he made his way across dewy meadows and between tall
hedgerows to the tarn. Stripping where the rabbit-cropped sward met the
mossy boulders, he swam out, joyously breasting the little ripples which
splashed and sparkled beneath the breeze that had got up with the sun.
Coming back, where the water lay in shadow beneath a larchwood which as
yet had not wholly lost its vivid vernal green, he disturbed the paddling
moor-hens and put up a mallard from a clump of swaying reeds. Then he
dressed and turned homeward, glowing, beside a sluggish stream which
wound through a waste of heather where the curlew were whistling eerily.
He had no cares to trouble him, and it was delightful to feel that he had
nothing to do except to enjoy himself in what he considered the fairest
country in the world, at least in summertime.