“Nothing.”

“Well, I hope I’m not annoying you by my company.”

No answer.  They walked on in silence, Carlia looking straight ahead, not so much at her parents, as at the distant snow-clad mountains.  Dorian felt like turning about and going home, but he could not do that very well, so he went on to the gate, where he would have said goodnight had not Mrs. Duke urged him to come in.  The father and mother went to bed early, leaving the two young people by the dining-room fire.

They managed to talk for some time on “wind and weather”.  Despite the paleness of cheek, Carlia was looking her best.  Dorian was jealous.

“Carlia,” he said, “why do you keep company with this Mr. Lamont?”

She was standing near the book-shelf with its meagre collection.  She turned abruptly at his question.

“Why shouldn’t I go with him?” she asked.

“You know why you shouldn’t.”

“I don’t.  Oh, I know the reasons usually given, but—­what am I to do.  He’s so nice, and a perfect gentleman.  What harm is there?”

“Why do you say that to me, Carlia?”

“Why not to you?” She came and sat opposite him by the table.  He was silent, and she repeated her question, slowly, carefully, and with emphasis.  “Why not to you?  Why should you care?”

“But I do care.”

“I don’t believe it.  You have never shown that you do.”

“I am showing it now.”

“Tomorrow you will forget it—­forget me for a month.”

“Carlia!”

“You’ve done it before—­many times—­you’ll do it again.”

The girl’s eyes flashed.  She seemed keyed up to carry through something she had planned to do, something hard.  She arose and stood by the table, facing him.

“I sometimes have thought that you cared for me—­but I’m through with that now.  Nobody really cares for me.  I’m only a rough farm hand.  I know how to milk and scrub and churn and clean the stable—­an’ that’s what I do day in and day out.  There’s no change, no rest for me, save when he takes me away from it for a little while.  He understands, he’s the only one who does.”

“But, Carlia!”

“You,” she continued in the same hard voice, “you’re altogether too good and too wise for such as I. You’re so high up that I can’t touch you.  You live in the clouds, I among the clods.  What have we two in common?”

“Much, Carlia—­I—­”

He arose and came to her, but she evaded him.

“Keep away, Dorian; don’t touch me.  You had better go home now.”

“You’re not yourself, Carlia.  What is the matter?  You have never acted like this before.”

“It’s not because I haven’t felt like it, but it’s because I haven’t had the courage; but now it’s come out, and I can’t stop it.  It’s been pent up in me like a flood—­now it’s out.  I hate this old farm—­I hate everything and everybody—­I—­hate you!”

Dorian arose quickly as if he had been lifted to his feet.  What was she saying?  She was wild, crazy wild.