Part 9 (1/2)

She looked up at him, startled, but met only a quiet smile. ”How did you--I didn't mean you----”

”I know you did n't--and you were very kind not to show how you must have felt. Perhaps it would be in better taste for me not to mention it at all. But I wanted you to know that I appreciated your courtesy in accepting the situation.”

”But how----”

”I found out--from a little slip of Miss s.h.i.+rley's. I wanted to go home, of course, but--I could n't make up my mind to spoil my sister's evening, and besides--I thought your brother's invitation made it right for us to be here.”

Olive's dark face was colouring warmly. She looked down at her roses, wondering what to say. Somehow she found herself unwilling to let Peter Bell think she did n't want him at her party, for it was becoming clear to her that she did.

”I'm so sorry,” she murmured. ”But I'm very glad you did n't go home.

If I had known you longer I 'm sure I should have invited----”

”Don't bother to explain,” urged Peter's low voice. ”'I did n't tell you to make you uncomfortable. Perhaps you won't mind my saying that looking on at this sort of thing is very interesting to me. I 've never seen it before.”

”How do you like it?” asked Olive, glancing up at him curiously.

Peter laughed, looking off for a moment toward the drawing-room. ”I 'm an outdoor sort of chap, I think,” he said. ”Yet it's very pretty, all that down there, and I like to look at it. Miss Townsend, do you ride horseback much?”

”Sometimes--not often. I don't care for it.”

”Neither should I, down the boulevard or in the park, but out on a country road. I 'm a country boy, and I like a good gallop down the old Northboro Road--miles of it as smooth as a floor. As for cross-country--ah, there's sport!”

”I 've never seen you ride.”

Peter's face changed. ”No, I don't ride now,” he said.

”But you have Sat.u.r.day afternoons free?”

”Oh, yes.”

”There are three saddle-horses in the stable,” said Olive, making a sudden resolve, ”and only one of them gets much use. Would you--care to take me for a gallop down the Northboro Road some day?”

That she should make such a proposition as this would have seemed to Olive Townsend but an hour before preposterous. But now, looking up at the st.u.r.dy figure before her, noting the wistful smile with which Peter had spoken of past experiences, it had come to her all at once that a new pleasure might be hers. She saw plainly that she should not be ashamed of Peter as an escort anywhere.

Peter stared at his hostess for a moment as if he could hardly believe that he had heard aright. ”Do you really mean that, Miss Townsend?” he asked.

”Indeed I do. I 'm not in the habit of saying things I don't mean.”

”Then, thank you, I should like it immensely,” he said, with a smile and bow, more attractive, Olive admitted to herself, than any she had received that evening.

CHAPTER VI

WEEDS AND FLOWERS

”Good morning, Miss Jane Bell! May I come in?”

Jane lifted her head quickly from over the phlox-bed she was weeding in the little garden back of the house, to see Forrest Townsend looking over the wooden gate which shut away the garden from the surrounding neighborhood.

”Good morning! Yes, indeed, come in,” she responded blithely, waving a discarded white ruffled sunbonnet at her guest. He vaulted over the low barrier and came swinging down the narrow path to the end of the enclosure, where the phlox-bed lay. Here he stood still, regarding with favour the girl in the blue dress, whose bronze-tinted hair glinted in the early June sunlight.