ecision that brought home to her
her youth and smallness.

"You are shutting all the damp in," she protested, shifting her point
of attack, "and that is very unwholesome. I shan't get warm; I haven't
any warmth to start with; you are wasting what you have got to no
purpose."

But he did not waste it, for eventually it was arranged that they sat
close together under the tree, with the coat put as far as it would go
over both of them. Rawson-Clew was not given to thinking how things
looked, he did what he thought necessary, or advisable, without taking
any thought of that kind; so it did not occur to him how this
arrangement might look to an unprejudiced observer, had there been any
such. But Julia, with her faculty for seeing herself as others saw
her, was much, though silently, amused as she thought of the Van
Heigens. Poor, kind folks, they were doubtless already wondering what
could have become of her; if they could only have seen her sitting
thus, with an unknown man, what would their Dutch propriety have said?

"Do you suppose this fog will be in the town?" Rawson-Clew said, after
a time.

"No," she answered, "I should think not; from what I have heard, I
think it is very unlikely."

"Then the Van Heigens won't know what has become of you?"

"Not a bit in the world; they don't even know where I was going
to-day. I did not tell them; I am afraid they will be rather uneasy
about me, but perhaps not so very much, they know by this time I can
take care of myself; besides, I shall be home before bed-time, if the
fog lifts."

Rawson-Clew agreed, and they talked of other things. Julia held the
opinion that when an evil has to be endured, not cured, there is no
good in discussing it over and over again; she had a considerable gift
for making the best of other things besides opportunities.

But the fog did not lift soon; it did not grow denser, but it did not
grow less; it just lay soft and chilly, casting a white pall of
silence on all things, closing day before its time, and making it
impossible to say when evening ended and night began. Gradually the
two who waited for its lifting fell into silence, and Julia, tired
out, at last dropped asleep, her head tilted back against the
tree-trunk, her shoulder pressed close against Rawson-Clew under the
shelter of his coat.

He did not move, he was afraid of waking her; he sat watching, waiting
in the eerie white stillness, until at last the space before him
altered,