close to
my shoulder that it was hard work not to turn and kiss it.

My mind was, set to make the most of my good fortune, but the thought of
young Torode, and of Carette riding back with him, kept coming upon me like
an east wind on a sunny day, and I found myself more tongue-tied than ever
I had been with her before, even of late years.

Did she care for this man? Had his good looks, which I could not deny, cast
dust in her eyes? Could she be blind to his black humours, which, to me,
were more visible even than his good looks?

From what Aunt Jeanne had said, he was by way of being very well off. And
perhaps the results of the Miss Maugers' teachings would incline a girl to
consider such things. I thought they probably would. I know they made me
feel shy and awkward before her, though I told myself furiously that all
that was only a matter of outside polish, and that inside I was as worthy
of her as any, and loved her as none other could. But the outside she could
see, and the inside she could not, and I could not yet tell her, though I
could not but think she must know.

And then, what had I to offer her in place of Torode's solid advantages?
Just myself, and all my heart, and two strong arms. They were good things,
and no one in the world could love her as I did. But, to a girl brought up
as she had been of late, would they be enough? And would these things
satisfy her father, who had always been much of a mystery to us all, and
who might have his own views as to her future, as the education he had
given her seemed to indicate?

I had plenty to think about as we jogged along on Gray Robin, and Carette
was thoughtful too.

Now and again, indeed, the clinging arms would give me a convulsive hug
which set my blood jumping, but that was only when Gray Robin stumbled, and
it meant nothing more than a fear of falling overboard on her part, and I
could not build on it.

We chatted, by snatches, of the party and of things that had happened in my
absence. But of the sweet whispers and little confidences which should set
all riders on Riding Day above all the rest of the world, there were none
between us, and at times we fell to silence and a touch of constraint.

On Eperquerie Common I got down, and led Gray Robin cautiously over the
long green slopes among the cushions of gorse and the waist-high ferns, and
down the rocky way to the knoll above the landing-place. And as we sat on
the soft turf among the empty shells