of the water. Yet more subtly than by
physical terrors did these deeps affect her, for the fathomless
mill-pool always seemed, as they hung upon it, to ask a question. With
such an air of horrible invitation it asked her where she was going with
Guy, that no amount of self-reproach for a morbid fancy could drive away
the fact of the question's being always asked, however firmly she might
fortify herself against paying attention. The moment they passed out of
reach of that smooth and cruel countenance, Pauline was always ashamed
of the terror and never confided in Guy what a mixture of emotions the
mill-pool could conjecture for her. Their journey across it was in this
sunny weather the prelude to a cool time on the stream that flowed along
the foot of the Abbey grounds. During May they had been wont to paddle
directly up the smaller main stream, exploring far along the western
valley; but on these June afternoons such a course involved too much
energy. So they used to disembark from the canoe, pulling it over a
narrow strip of grass to be launched again on the Abbey stream, which
had been dammed up to flow with the greater width and solemnity that
suited the grand house shimmering in eternal ghostliness at the top of
the dark plantation. Pauline had no dread of Wychford Abbey at this
distance, and she was fond of gliding down this stream into which the
great beeches dipped their tresses, shading it from the heat of the sun.

Every hour they spent on the river made them long to spend more hours
together, and Pauline began to tell herself she was more deeply in love
than any one she had ever known. Everything except love was floating
away from her like the landscape astern of the canoe. She began to
neglect various people in Wychford over whom she had hitherto watched
with maternal solicitude; even Miss Verney was not often visited,
because she and Guy could not go together, the one original rule to
which Mrs. Grey still clung being a prohibition of walking together
through the town. And with the people went her music. She did not
entirely give up playing, but she always played so badly that Monica
declared once she would rather such playing were given up. In years gone
by Pauline had kept white fantail pigeons; but now they no longer
interested her and she gave them away in pairs. Birdwood declared that
the small bee-garden, which from earliest childhood had belonged to her
guardianship, was a "proper disgrace." Her tamb