as she sped
across the moor.

Her steps slackened as she neared the larch-wood, for she had not
ventured into it since the night of old Halkett's death; but it was
possible that George would be working in the yard and, tiptoeing down
the soft path, she issued on the cobble-stones.

George was not there, nor could she hear him, and she was constrained to
knock on the closed door, but the face of Mrs. Biggs, who appeared
after a stealthy pause, was not encouraging to the visitor. She looked
at Miriam and her thin lips parted and joined again without speech.

"I want Mr. Halkett," Miriam said, straightening herself and speaking
haughtily because she guessed that Mrs. Biggs was suspicious of her
friendliness with George.

"He's out. You'll have to wait," she said and shut the door.

A cold wind was swooping into the hollow, but Miriam was hot with a
gathering anger that rushed into words as Halkett appeared.

"George!" She ran to him. "I hate that woman. I always did. I wish you
wouldn't keep her. Oh, I hate her!"

"But you didn't come here to tell me that," he said. In her haste she
had allowed him to take her hand and the touch of her softened his
resentment at her neglect; amusement narrowed his eyes until she could
not see their blue.

"She's horrid, she's rude; she left me on the step. I didn't want to go
in, but she oughtn't to have left me standing there."

"She ought not. I'll tell her."

"Dare you?"

"Dare I!" he repeated boastfully.

"But you mustn't! Don't, George, please don't. Promise you won't.
Promise, George."

"All right."

"Thank you." She drew her hand away.

"The fact is, she's always pretty hard on you."

Miriam's flame went out. "You don't mean," she said coldly, "that you
discuss me with her?"

"No, I do not."

"You swear you never have?"

He had a pleasing and indulgent smile. "Yes, I swear it, but she
dislikes the whole lot of you, and you can't always stop a woman's
talk."

"You should be able to," she said. She wished she had not come for
George did not realize what was due to her. She would go to John and she
nodded a cold good-bye.

Her hands were in the pockets of her brown woollen coat, her shoulders
were lifted towards her ears; she was less beautiful than he had ever
seen her, yet in her kindest moments she had not seemed so near to him.
He was elated by this discovery; he did not seek its cause and, had he
done so, he was not acute enough to see that hitherto