disposed to
talk; the few words she said, fell unwillingly from her lips. The
stillness of the forest laid its spell upon them: each faint rustling
among the leaves was audible; not a living thing stirred except
themselves. The tall firs and beeches stretched infinitely upwards, and
the patches of light that lay here and there on the moss, made the cool
darkness seem darker.

When they walked on again, Maurice put his arm through hers, and, in.
this intimacy of touch, was conscious of every step she took. It made
him happy to suit his pace to hers, to draw her aside from a spreading
root or loose stone, and to feel her respond to his pressure. She
walked for the most part languidly, looking to the ground. But at a
thickly wooded turn of the path, where it was very dark, where the
sunlight seemed far away, and the pine-scent was more pungent than
elsewhere, she stopped, to drink in the spicy air with open lips and
nostrils.

"It's like wine. Maurice, I'm glad we came here--that you found this
place. Think of it, we might still be sitting indoors, with the blinds
drawn, knowing that the pavements were baking in the sun. While here!
... Oh, I shall be happy here!"

She was roused for a moment to a rapturous content with her
surroundings. She looked childishly happy and very young. Maurice
pressed her arm, without speaking: he was so foolishly happy that her
praise of the place affected him like praise of himself. Again, he had
a chastened feeling of exhilaration: as though an acme of satisfaction
had been reached, beyond which it was impossible to go.

On catching sight of the rambling wooden building, in the midst of the
clearing that had been made among the encroaching trees, Louise gave
another cry of pleasure, and before entering the house, went to the
edge of the terrace, and looked down on the plains. But upstairs, in
her room on the first storey, he made her rest in an arm-chair by the
window. He himself prepared the tea, proud to perform the first of the
trivial services which, from now on, were to be his. There was nothing
he would not do for her, and, as a beginning, he persuaded her to lie
down on the sofa and try to sleep.

Once outside again, he did not know how to kill time; and the remainder
of the afternoon seemed interminable. He endeavoured to read, but could
not take in the meaning of two consecutive sentences. He was afraid to
go far away, in case she should wake and miss him. So he loitered about