The perilous point passed, unconsciously to both of them, they fell into freer conversation, tacitly avoiding the subject of Mr. Hurlstone’s past reserve only as being less interesting.  Hurlstone did not return Miss Keene’s confidences—­not because he wished to deceive her, but that he preferred to entertain her; while she did not care to know his secret now that it no longer affected their sympathy in other things.  It was a pleasant, innocent selfishness, that, however, led them along, step by step, to more uncertain and difficult ground.

In their idle, happy walk they had strayed towards the beach, and had come upon a large stone cross with its base half hidden in sand, and covered with small tenacious, sweet-scented creepers, bearing a pale lilac blossom that exhaled a mingled odor of sea and shore.  Hurlstone pointed out the cross as one of the earliest outposts of the Church on the edge of the unclaimed heathen wilderness.  It was hung with strings of gaudy shells and feathers, which Hurlstone explained were votive offerings in which their pagan superstitions still mingled with their new faith.

“I don’t like to worry that good old Padre,” he continued, with a light smile, “but I’m afraid that they prefer this cross to the chapel for certain heathenish reasons of their own.  I am quite sure that they still hold some obscure rites here under the good Father’s very nose, and that, in the guise of this emblem of our universal faith, they worship some deity we have no knowledge of.”

“It’s a shame,” said Miss Keene quickly.

To her surprise, Hurlstone did not appear so shocked as she, in her belief of his religious sympathy with the Padre, had imagined.

“They’re a harmless race,” he said carelessly.  “The place is much frequented by the children—­especially the young girls; a good many of these offerings came from them.”

The better to examine these quaint tributes, Miss Keene had thrown herself, with an impulsive, girlish abandonment, on the mound by the cross, and Hurlstone sat down beside her.  Their eyes met in an innocent pleasure of each other’s company.  She thought him very handsome in the dark, half official Mexican dress that necessity alone had obliged him to assume, and much more distinguished-looking than his companions in their extravagant foppery; he thought her beauty more youthful and artless than he had imagined it to be, and with his older and graver experiences felt a certain protecting superiority that was pleasant and reassuring.

Nevertheless, seated so near each other, they were very quiet.  Hurlstone could not tell whether it was the sea or the flowers, but the dress of the young girl seemed to exhale some subtle perfume of her own freshness that half took away his breath.  She had scraped up a handful of sand, and was allowing it to escape through her slim fingers in a slender rain on the ground.  He was watching the operation with what he began to fear was fatuous imbecility.