As she spoke she was aware that some one was near her. A sudden
footfall, a sudden pause, followed her words. She lifted her head, then
she sat up. The tears had flowed and her cheeks were wet with them, but
of that she was not conscious, so great was her surprise at finding
Franklin Winslow Kane standing before her on the mossy path.

Mr. Kane carried his straw hat in his hand. He was very warm, his hair
was untidy on his moist brow, his boots were white with dust, his
trousers were turned up from them and displayed an inch or so of thin
ankle encased in oatmeal-coloured socks. His tie--Helen noted the one
salient detail among the many dull ones that made up a whole so
incongruous with the magic scene--was of a peculiarly harsh and ugly
shade of blue. He had only just climbed over a low wall near by and
that was why he had come upon her so inaudibly and had, so
inadvertently, been a witness of her grief.

He did not, however, show embarrassment, but looked at her with the
hesitant yet sympathetic attentiveness of a vagrant dog.

Helen sat on the moss, her feet extended before her, and she returned
his look from her tearful eyes, making no attempt to soften the oddity
of the situation. She found, indeed, a gloomy amusement in it, and was
aware of wondering what Mr. Kane, who made so much of everything, would
make of their mutual predicament.

'Have you been having a long walk, too?' she asked.

He looked at her, smiling now a little, as if he wagged a responsive
tail; but he was not an ingratiating dog, only a friendly and a troubled
one.

'Yes, I have,' he said. 'We have got rather a long way off, Miss
Buchanan.'

'That's a comfort sometimes, isn't it,' said Helen. She took out her
handkerchief and dried her eyes, drawing herself, then, into a more
comfortable position against the trunk of a beech-tree.

'You'd rather I went away, wouldn't you,' said Mr. Kane; 'but let me say
first that I'm very sorry to have intruded, and very sorry indeed to see
that you're unhappy.'

She now felt that she did not want him to go, indeed she felt that she
would rather he stayed. After the loneliness of her despair, she liked
the presence of the friendly, wandering dog. It would be comforting to
have it sit down beside you and to have it thud its tail when you
chanced to look at it. Mr. Kane would not intrude, he would be a
consolation.

'No, don't go,' she said. 'Do sit down and rest. It's frightfully hot,
isn't it.'