violence; with the broad leafage of the glen arched over it in warm,
still sunshine, wondrously beautiful.

They wandered some way by the river banks; then drove to other spots of
which Otway spoke, lunched at a village inn, and by four o'clock
returned altogether to the Castle. After tea, Piers found himself alone
with Irene. Mrs. Borisoff had left the room whilst he was speaking, and
so silently that for a moment he was not aware of her withdrawal. Alone
with Irene, for the first time since he had known her; even at Ewell,
long ago, they had never been together without companionship. There
fell a silence. Piers could not lift his eyes to the face which had all
day been before him, the face which seemed more than ever beautiful
amid nature's beauties. He wished to thank her for the letter she had
written him to St. Petersburg, but was fearful of seeming to make too
much of this mark of kindness. Irene herself resumed the conversation.

"You will continue to write for the reviews, I hope?"

"I shall try to," he answered softly.

"Your Russian must be very idiomatic. I found it hard in places."

Overcome with delight, he looked at her and bent towards her.

"Mrs. Borisoff told me you had learnt. I know what that means--learning
Russian in England, out of books. I began to do it at Ewell--do you
remember?"

"Yes, I remember very well. Have you written anything besides these two
articles?"

"Written--yes, but not published. I have written all sorts of things."
His voice shook. "Even--verse."

He repented the word as soon as it was uttered. Again his eyes could
not move towards hers.

"I know you have," said Irene, in the voice of one who smiles.

"I have never been sure that you knew it--that you received those
verses."

"To tell you the truth, I didn't know how to acknowledge them. I never
received the dedication of a poem, before or since, and in my
awkwardness I put off my thanks till it was too late to send them. But
I remember the lines; I think they were beautiful. Shall you ever
include them in a volume?"

"I wrote no more, I am no poet. Yet if you had given a word of
praise"--he laughed, as one does when emotion is too strong--"I should
have written on and on, with a glorious belief in myself."

"Perhaps it was as well, then, that I said nothing. Poetry must come of
itself, without praise--don't you think?"

"Yes, I lived it--or tried to live it--instead of putting it into
metre."

"That's exac