He was silent, looking at her.  For the first time he caught himself noticing her dress.  It was of simple pale blue linen, relieved with white embroidered lawn, and in its cool, fresh, clean appearance was in keeping with the clear bright day.  A plain straw garden hat tied across the crown and under the chin with a strip of soft blue ribbon to match the linen gown, was the finish to this ‘fashionable’ young woman’s toilette,—­and though it was infinitely becoming to the fair skin, azure eyes, and gold-brown hair of its wearer, it did not suggest undue extravagance, or a Paris ‘mode.’  And while he yet almost unconsciously studied the picture she made, resting one arm lightly across his garden gate, she lifted the latch suddenly and swung it open.

“Good-bye!” and she nodded smilingly—­“Thank you so much for letting me see your lovely garden!  As soon as Cicely arrives, you must come and see her—­you will, won’t you?”

“I shall be most happy—–­” he murmured.

“She will be so interested to hear how you sent her my telegram,”—­ continued Maryllia—­“And Gigue too—­poor old Gigue!—­he is sure to come over here some time during the summer.  He is such a quaint person!  I think you will like him.  Good-bye!”

“Good-bye—­for the present!” said John with a slight note of appeal in his voice, which was not lost wholly upon the air alone, for Maryllia turned her head back towards him with a laugh.

“Oh, of course!—­only for the present!  We are really next-door neighbours, and I’m afraid we can’t escape each other unless we each play hermit in separate caves!  But I promise not to bore you with my presence very often!”

She waved the spray of white lilac he had given her in farewell, and calling her dog to her side, passed down the village road lightly, like a blue flower drifting with the May breeze, and was soon out of sight.

Walden closed the gate after her with careful slowness, and returned across the lawn to his favourite seat under his favourite apple-tree.  Nebbie followed him, disconsolately snuffing the ground in the trail of the departed Plato, who doubtless, to the smaller animal’s mind, represented a sort of canine monarch who ruthlessly disdained the well-meaning attentions of his inferiors.  Bainton, having finished his task of training the vines across the walls of the rectory, descended his ladder, making as much noise as he could about it and adding thereto a sudden troublesome cough which would he considered, probably excite his master’s sympathy and instant attention.  But Walden paid no heed.  He was apparently busy fumbling with his watch-chain.  Bainton waited a moment, and then, unable any longer to control his curiosity, seized his ladder and deliberately carried it across the lawn, though he knew that that was not the proper way to the tool-shed where it was kept.  Halting close to the seat under the apple-tree, he said:—­

“Yon red honeysuckle’s comin’ on fine, Passon,—­it be as full o’ bud as a pod o’ peas.”