“I am in love with you,” he declared.

“Naturally,” she replied.  “The question is—­” She paused and looked intently at the tip of her slipper.  It was very small and very pointed and it was quite impossible to ignore the fact that she had a remarkably pretty foot and that she wore white silk stockings.  Burton had never known any one before who wore white silk stockings.

“I am very much in love with you,” he repeated.  “I cannot help it.  It is not my fault—­that is to say, it is as much your fault as it is mine.”

The corners of her mouth twitched.

“Is it?  Well, what are you going to do about it?”

“I am going to take you down to the orchard, through the little gate, and across the plank into the hayfield,” he announced, boldly.  “I am going to sit with you under the oak tree, where we can just catch the view of the moor through the dip in the hills.  We will lean back and watch the clouds—­those little white, fleecy, broken-off pieces—­and I will tell you fairy stories.  We shall be quite alone there and perhaps you will let me hold your hand.”

She shook her head, gently but very firmly.  “Such things are impossible.”

“Because I have a wife at Garden Green?”

She nodded.

“Because you have a wife, and because—­I had really quite forgotten to mention it before, but as a matter of fact I am half engaged to someone myself.”

He went suddenly white.

“You are not serious?” he demanded.  “Perfectly,” she assured him.  “I can’t think how I forgot it.”

“Does he come here to see you?” Burton asked, jealously.

“Not very often.  He has to work hard.”  Burton leaned back in his seat.  The music of life seemed suddenly to be playing afar off—­so far that he could only dimly catch the strains.  The wind, too, must have changed—­the perfume of the roses reached him no more.

“I thought you understood,” he said slowly.

She did not speak again for several moments.  Then she rose a little abruptly to her feet.

“You can walk as far as the hayfield with me,” she said.

They passed down the narrow garden path in single file.  There had been a storm in the night and the beds of pink and white stocks lay dashed and drooping with a weight of glistening rain-drops.  The path was strewn with rose petals and the air seemed fuller than ever of a fresh and delicate fragrance.  At the end of the garden, a little gate led into the orchard.  Side by side they passed beneath the trees.

“Tell me,” he begged in a low tone, “about this lover of yours!”

“There is so little to tell,” she answered.  “He is a member of the firm who publish books for my father.  He is quite kind to us both.  He used to come down here more often, even, than he does now, and one night he asked my father whether he might speak to me.”

“And your father?”

“My father was very much pleased,” she continued.  “We have little money and father is not very strong.  He told me that it had taken a weight off his mind.”