"Well, come along."

They wandered far into the untouched forest. "Ah! here it is," she cried.
A spring of water ran out from among the anchoring roots of a huge black
spruce. He stood gazing down at it.

"Oh, Leila, isn't it wonderful?"

"Were you never here before, John?"

"No, never. It seems as if it was born out of the tree. No wonder this
spruce grew so tall and strong. How cold it must keep the old fellow's
toes."

"What queer ideas you have, John." She had not yet the gift of fancy,
long denied to some in the emergent years of approaching womanhood. "I am
tired, John," she said, as she dropped with hands clasped behind her head
and hidden in the glorious abundance of darkening red hair, which lay
around her on the brown pine-needles like the disordered aureole of some
careless-minded saint.

John said, "It is this terrible heat. I never before heard you complain
of being tired."

"Oh, it's just nice tired." She lay still, comfortable, with open eyes
staring up at the intense blue of the September sky seen through the
wide-east limbs of pine and spruce. The little rill, scarce a finger
thickness of water, crawled out lazily between the roots and trickled
away. The girl was in empty-minded enjoyment of the luxury of complete
relaxation of every muscle of her strong young body. The spring was
noiseless, no leaf was astir in all the forest around them. The girl lay
still, a part of the vast quietness.

John Penhallow stood a moment, and then said, "Good gracious! Leila, your
eyes are blue." It was true. When big eyes are wide open staring up at
the comrade blue of the deep blue sky, they win a certain beauty of added
colour like little quiet lakelets under the azure sky when no wind
disturbs their power of reflecting capture.

"Oh, John, and didn't you know my eyes were blue?" She spoke with languid
interest in the fact he announced.

"But," he said, looking down at her as he stood, "they're so--so
very blue."

"Oh, all the Greys have blue eyes."

He laughed gentle laughter and dropped on the pine-needles of the forest
floor. The spring lay between them. He felt, as she did not, the charm of
the stillness. He wanted to find words in which to put his desire for
expression. She broke into his mood of imaginative seekings.

"How cold it is," she said, gathering the water in the cup of her hand,
and then with both hands did better and got a refreshing drink.

"That makes a better cup," he said. "Let