If every
girl or woman the boy knew was to cause such a feeling in her, what would
life be like? And her will hardened against her fears. She was looking
brilliant herself; and she saw that the girl in her turn could not help
gazing at her eagerly, wistfully, a little bewildered--hatefully young.
And the boy? Slowly, surely, as a magnet draws, Anna could feel that she
was drawing him, could see him stealing chances to look at her. Once she
surprised him full. What troubled eyes! It was not the old adoring
face; yet she knew from its expression that she could make him want
her--make him jealous--easily fire him with her kisses, if she would.

And the dinner wore to an end. Then came the moment when the girl and
she must meet under the eyes of the mother, and that sharp,
quaint-looking old governess. It would be a hard moment, that! And it
came--a hard moment and a long one, for Gordy sat full span over his
wine. But Anna had not served her time beneath the gaze of upper Oxford
for nothing; she managed to be charming, full of interest and questions
in her still rather foreign accent. Miss Doone--soon she became
Sylvia--must show her all the treasures and antiquities. Was it too dark
to go out just to look at the old house by night? Oh, no. Not a bit.
There were goloshes in the hall. And they went, the girl leading, and
talking of Anna knew not what, so absorbed was she in thinking how for a
moment, just a moment, she could contrive to be with the boy alone.

It was not remarkable, this old house, but it was his home--might some
day perhaps be his. And houses at night were strangely alive with their
window eyes.

"That is my room," the girl said, "where the jessamine is--you can just
see it. Mark's is above--look, under where the eave hangs out, away to
the left. The other night--"

"Yes; the other night?"

"Oh, I don't--! Listen. That's an owl. We have heaps of owls. Mark
likes them. I don't, much."

Always Mark!

"He's awfully keen, you see, about all beasts and birds--he models them.
Shall I show you his workshop?--it's an old greenhouse. Here, you can see
in."

There through the glass Anna indeed could just see the boy's quaint
creations huddling in the dark on a bare floor, a grotesque company of
small monsters. She murmured:

"Yes, I see them, but I won't really look unless he brings me himself."

"Oh, he's sure to. They interest him more than anything in the world."

For all her