taken his shoes with her. So Ambrose's feet were now encased
in a pair of hot carpet slippers, a whole size too small for him, so
that he could not even shuffle without crumpling his toes or else
walking about in his socks.

Several times he sighed, pushing back his long hair, a gesture with him
expressive of mental unrest. Why, oh, why, had he given up his original
plan of two days' solitary freedom and companionship with nature? Peachy
had never seemed less alluring, and as for physical comfort or even the
pleasure of her society, had he gained either? Cold shivers every now
and then had their way up and down the young man's spine in the course
of his meditations, notwithstanding the warmth of the room. For he knew
himself to be easily stirred, so supposing that he and Peachy had taken
the walk together that morning and something serious had happened! By
and by young Ambrose began to feel as utterly uninterested in female
charms, as cool and remote as a snow-capped mountain, and at about this
moment Peachy returned to the room.

She was wearing a pure white dress and, moving over into a dark corner,
smiling at her suitor, she sat down on a small sofa. Here, by dint of
pinning his toes down into his slippers, and letting his heels rise
above them, Ambrose managed to arrive a few seconds later. He was close
up beside her, as comfortably near as Peachy's starched clothes
permitted, liking the clean smell of her dress, the perfume of her body;
there were odours about her of warm new milk, of fresh honey, of
ripening fruits.

And quite by accident, it seemed to him, the girl's plump hand was laid
near his, so that a moment later it required pressing. Then the kerchief
about her full breast, rising and falling softly, showed a hint of
something whiter and softer beneath. With surprising rapidity the boy's
recent regret for his lost holiday began slipping away from him. The
room was still close, but a breeze blowing in from the partly raised
window fanned them both. Perhaps Ambrose's head was swimming from
fatigue and drowsiness, perhaps from his sense of his companion's
nearness, of her readiness to fall into his arms with his first desiring
touch.

"Peachy," Ambrose was whispering, when stealthily the door of the
parlour opened, and there stood Peachy's father, his red face wearing
such an expression of amusement and coarse understanding that instantly
Ambrose felt a return of his former coldness. His boots having bee