In fact, she was. Now that the meeting she had
anticipated these twelve hours past was actually at
hand, there woke in her breast an unreasoning panic.
Miss Hugonin considered, and caught up her skirts,
and whisked into the summer-house, and there sat down
in the darkest corner and devoutly wished Mr. Woods
in Crim Tartary, or Jericho, or, in a word, any region
other than the gardens of Selwoode.
Billy came presently to the opening in the hedge and
stared at the deserted bench. He was undeniably
in a temper. But, then, how becoming it was!
thought someone.
“Miss Hugonin!” he said, coldly.
Evidently (thought someone) he intends to be just
as nasty as possible.
“Peggy!” said Mr. Woods, after a little.
Perhaps (thought someone) he won’t be very
nasty.
“Dear Peggy!” said Mr. Woods, in his most
conciliatory tone.
Someone rearranged her hair complacently.
But there was no answer, save the irresponsible chattering
of the birds, and with a sigh Billy turned upon his
heel.
Then, by the oddest chance in the world, Margaret
coughed.
I dare say it was damp in the summer-house; or perhaps
it was caused by some passing bronchial irritation;
or perhaps, incredible as it may seem, she coughed
to show him where she was. But I scarcely think
so, because Margaret insisted afterward—very
positively, too—that she didn’t cough
at all.
“Well!” Mr. Woods observed, lengthening
the word somewhat.
In the intimate half-light of the summer-house, he
loomed prodigiously big. He was gazing downward
in careful consideration of three fat tortoise-shell
pins and a surprising quantity of gold hair, which
was practically all that he could see of Miss Hugonin’s
person; for that young lady had suddenly become a
limp mass of abashed violet ruffles, and had discovered
new and irresistible attractions in the mosaics about
her feet.
Billy’s arms were crossed on his breast and
his right hand caressed his chin meditatively.
By and bye, “I wonder, now,” he reflected,
aloud, “if you can give any reason—any
possible reason—why you shouldn’t
be locked up in the nearest sanatorium?”
“You needn’t be rude, you know,”
a voice observed from the neighbourhood of the ruffles,
“because there isn’t anything you can do
about it.”
Mr. Woods ventured a series of inarticulate observations.
“But why?” he concluded, desperately.
“But why, Peggy?—in Heaven’s
name, what’s the meaning of all this?”
She looked up. Billy was aware of two large blue
stars; his heart leapt; and then he recalled a pair
of gray-green eyes that had regarded him in much the
same fashion not long ago, and he groaned.
