suddenly that her eyes were full of tears. For the
first time for many years he nearly lost his head.

"Perhaps," he suggested, dropping his voice and astonished to find that
it was not quite so steady as usual, "he has been waiting!"

"I am afraid not," she answered, looking down for a moment at the buckle
in her waistband.

He looked round.

"If only he were here now," he said. "Could one conceive a more
favourable opportunity? An April morning, sunshine, flowers, everything
in the air to make him forget that he is an old fogey and doesn't
deserve----"

She lifted her eyes to his, now deliciously wet. Her brows were
delicately uplifted.

"I couldn't do it," she murmured, "unless he were in the same room."

Deyes stepped over the hyacinths and vaulted through the window.

* * * * *

Wilhelmina selected a freshly cut tree-stump, carefully brushed away the
sawdust, and sat down. Macheson chose another and lighted a cigarette.
Eventually they decided that they were too far away, and selected a
tree-trunk where there was room for both. Wilhelmina unrolled a plan,
and glancing now and then at the forest of scaffold poles to their left,
proceeded to try to realize the incomplete building. Macheson watched
her with a smile.

"Victor," she exclaimed, "you are not to laugh at me! Remember this is
my first attempt at doing anything--worth doing, and, of course, I'm
keen about it. Are you sure we shall have enough bedrooms?"

"Enough for a start, at any rate," he answered. "We can always add to
it."

She looked once more at that forest of poles, at the slowly rising
walls, through whose empty windows one could see pictures of the valley
below.

"One can build----" she murmured, "one can build always. But think,
Victor, what a lot of time I wasted before I knew you. I might have done
so much."

He smiled reassuringly.

"There is plenty of time," he declared. "Better to start late and build
on a sure foundation, you know. A good many of my houses had to come
down as fast as they went up. Do you remember, for instance, how I
wanted to convert all your villagers by storm?"

She smiled.

"Still--I'm glad you came to try," she said softly. "That horrid foreman
is watching us, Victor. I am going to look the other way."

"He has gone now," Macheson said, slipping his arm around her waist.
"Dear, do you know I don't think that one person can build very well
alone. It's a cold sort of