John stood still.  Nature had been busy with her artist-work.  A year had gone by—­the year of maturing growth of mind and body for a girl nearing sixteen.  Unprepared for her change, John felt at once that this was a woman, who quickly smiling gave him a cordial greeting and her hand.  “Why, John Penhallow,” she said, “what a big boy you are grown!” It was as if an older person had spoken to a younger.  A head taller than the little Mrs. Ann, she was in the bloom of maiden loveliness, rosy, joyous, a certain new stateliness in her movements.  The gift of grace had been added by the fairy godmother nature.

John said, with gravity, “You are most welcome home, Leila,” and then quickly aware of some coldness in his words, “Oh, I am so very glad to see you!” She had gone by him in the swift changes of life.  Without so putting it distinctly into the words of a mental soliloquy, John was conscious that here was another Leila.

“Come, in with you,” said the happy master of Grey Pine.

“How well you look, Ann, and how young!  The cart will bring your bundles.”

John Penhallow on an August afternoon was of Billy’s opinion that Leila had “rowed a lot” as she came out upon the porch and gaily laughing cried, “At last,—­Aunt Ann has done with me.”

They were both suffering from one of those dislocations of relation which even in adult life are felt when friends long apart come together again.  The feeling of loss, as far as John was concerned, grew less as Leila with return of childlike joy roamed with him over the house and through the stables, and next day through Westways, with a pleasant word for every one and on busying errands for her aunt.  He was himself occupied with study; but now the Squire had said it would be wise to drop his work.

With something of timidity he said to Leila, “I am free for this afternoon; come and see again our old playgrounds.  It will be a long while before we can take another walk.”

“Certainly, John.  And isn’t it a nice, good-natured day?  The summer is over.  Sometimes I wish we had no divisions of months, and the life of the year was one quiet flow of days—­oh, with no names to remind you.”

“But think, Leila, of losing all the poetry of the months.  Why not have no day or night?  Oh, come along.  What do you want with a sunshade and a veil—­we will be mostly in the woods.”

“My complexion, Mr. Penhallow,” cried Miss Grey gaily.

He watched her young figure as she went upstairs—­the mass of darkened gold hair coiled in the classic fashion of the day on the back of her head.  She looked around from the stair.  “I shall be ready in a minute, John.  It rained yesterday—­will it be wet in the woods?”

“No,” cried John, “and what does it matter?” He had a dull feeling of resentment, of loss, of consciousness of new barriers and of distance from the old comrade.

Their way led across the garden, which was showing signs of feeling the chilly nights of the close of summer in this upland, where the seasons sometimes change abruptly.