being in the woods with just the woods.  I’ve found that out.  People kind of keep your mind tied down to little things that part of you hates, don’t you know?  Like when I’m with Kate, I think about facial massage and manicuring, and shows that I’d like to see and can’t, and places where I’d like to go and eat and watch the people and dance and listen to the music, and can’t; and going to the beaches when I can’t, and taking automobile trips when I can’t, and boys—­and all that sort of thing.  But when I’m all by myself in the woods, I never think of those things.”

“I saw you down there by the hydrometer, all by yourself.  And you were using your powder puff to beat the band.”  A twinkle lived for a second or two in the somber brown of Jack’s eyes.

“You did?  Well, that was second nature.  I wasn’t thinking about it, anyway.”

“What were you thinking about when you kept staring up here?  Not the beauties of nature, I bet.”  A perverse spirit made Jack try to push her back into the frivolous talk he had so lately and so bitterly deplored.

“Well, I was wondering if you had gumption enough to appreciate being up where you could watch the mountains all the while, and see them by day and by night and get really acquainted with them, so that they would tell you things they remember about the world a thousand years ago.  I wondered if you had it in you to appreciate them, and know every little whim of a shadow and every little laugh of the sun—­or whether you just stayed up here because they pay you money for staying.  I’ve been so jealous of you, up here in your little glass house!  I’ve lain awake the last three nights, peeking through the tree-tops at the little speck of sky I could see with stars in it, and thinking how you had them spread out all around you—­and you asleep, maybe, and never looking!

“I’m awful sorry you’re in trouble, and about your mother and all.  But I think you’re the luckiest boy I know, because you just happened to get to this place.  Sometimes when I look at you I just want to take you by the shoulder and shake you!—­because you don’t half know how lucky you are.  Why, all that makes the world such a rotten place to live in is because the people are starved all the while for beauty.  Not beauty you can buy, but beauty like this around us, that you can feast on—­”

“And I get pretty well fed up on it, too, sometimes,” Jack put in, still perverse.

“And for that I pity you.  I was going to wash the dishes, but you can do it yourself.  I’m going out where I can forget there are any people in the world.  I’ll never have another night like this—­it would be too much luck for one person.”

She set down her cup, which she had been tilting back and forth in her fingers while she spoke.  She got up, pulled Jack’s heavy sweater off a nail in the corner, and went out without another word to him or a look toward him.  She seemed to be absolutely sincere in her calm disposal of him as something superfluous and annoying.  She seemed also to be just as sincere in her desire for a close companionship with the solitude that surrounded them.