On the further side of the bank of rhododendrons the path had descended into a sheltered hollow, screened altogether from the colder winds, and, even in this temperate month of May, a very trap for the afternoon sun.  And in this hollow was a clump of attenuated trees, with drooping leaves of a lacklustre hue, and a white bark peeling from the trunk; a pungent aroma, more medicinal than sylvan, hung rather heavily over the sequestered spot.

Rachel stood a moment with wide nostrils and round eyes; the look hardly lasted longer, and she said no more, but she was aware that Morna had made some answer to her question.

“What did you say?” inquired Rachel, turning politely to her visitor.

“I said they were blue gums from Australia.”

Rachel made no immediate comment; secretive she might have to be, but to a deliberate pretence she would not stoop.  So she did not even say, “Indeed!” but merely, after a pause, “You are something of a botanist yourself, then, Mrs. Woodgate?” For they had been talking of the gardens and of their history as they walked.

“I?” laughed Morna.  “I only wish I was; but I happen to remember Mr. Steel telling me that one day when we were here last summer.”

Rachel opened her eyes again, and her lips with them; but instead of speaking she went to the nearest gum-tree and picked a spray of the lacklustre leaves.  “I like the smell of them,” she said, as they went on; and the little incident left no impression upon Morna’s mind.

Yet presently she perceived that Mrs. Steel had some color after all—­at the moment Rachel happened to be smelling her gum-leaves—­and that she was altogether prettier than Morna had fancied hitherto.  The fact was that it was her first good look at Rachel, who had kept her back to the light indoors, and had literally led the way along the narrow paths, while her large hat had supplied a perpetual shadow of its own.  It was a pathetic habit, which had become second nature with Rachel during the last six months; but now, for once, it was forgotten, and her face raised unguardedly to the sun, which painted it in its true and sweet colors, to Morna’s surprise and real delight.  The vicar’s wife was one of those healthy-hearted young women who are the first to admire their own sex; she had very many friends among women, for whom marriage had not damped an enthusiasm which she hid from no one but themselves; and she was to be sufficiently enthusiastic about the thin but perfect oval of Rachel’s face, the soft, sweet hazel of her eyes, the impetuous upper lip and the brave lower one, as she saw them now for an instant in the afternoon sun.

Moreover, she was already interested in Rachel on her own account, and not only as the wife of the mysterious Mr. Steel.  There was an undoubted air of mystery about her also; but that might only be derived from him, and with all her reserve she could not conceal a sweet and sympathetic self from one as like her in that essential as they were different in all others.  Not that the reserve was all on one side.  Morna Woodgate had her own secrets too.  One of them, however, was extracted during their stroll.