tion. When he thought of the
girls to whom in the past of long vacations he had made protestations of
devotion that were light as the thistle-down in the summery meadows
where they were uttered, it was incredible that the asking of Pauline
should speed his heart like this. With other girls he had always
imagined them slightly in love with him, but for Pauline to be in love
with him seemed hopeless, though he qualified his humility by assuring
himself that she could be in love with nobody. Did Margaret really have
a suspicion that he was in love with Pauline? If she had, why had she
not drawn his confidence before she gave her own? She came out from the
cottage as he propounded this, and he told her, when their faces were
set towards Wychford and a chilly wind that was rising, how he had been
thinking about her confidence all the while she was in the cottage.
Moreover, he was under the impression this was the truth.

"But don't think about me any more," she commanded.

"Never?"

"Not until I speak first. Isn't it cold? You must have been frozen
waiting for me."

They hurried along, talking mostly, though how the topic arose Guy never
knew, about whether _Alice in Wonderland_ were better than _Alice
Through the Looking-glass_ or not. The quotations that went to sustain
the argument were so many that they arrived back very quickly, it
seemed, at the stile leading into the snowy field.

"Will you go home the same way?" Guy suggested. "Look, nobody has
spoiled our tracks. They're jollier than ever, and do you see those
rooks farther down the field? It will snow again this afternoon and our
footprints will vanish."

By the time they reached the Abbey wood Guy had made up his mind that as
they walked up through the shrubbery, unless people were listening
there, he would tell Margaret how deeply he was in love with Pauline.
The resolution taken, his throat seemed to close up with nervousness,
and, vaulting over the fence, he tripped and fell in a snow-drift.

"Why this violent activity all of a sudden?" Margaret asked.

He laughed gloomily and vowed it was the exhilarating weather. Up the
broad walk they went slowly, and every yard was bringing them dreadfully
nearer to Wychford High Street and the profanation of this snowy
silence. Abruptly a robin began to sing from a bough almost overhead;
and Guy, realizing half-unconsciously that unless he told Margaret now,
his words would die upon that robin's rathe melody, said