She sat thinking how he had come up behind her that day in the drawing-room car, and of all the happy nonsense they had begun to talk, in such a hurry, together.  She was lost in the imagination of that old surprise, living it over again, remembering how it had seemed when she suddenly knew that it was he who touched her shoulder.  Her thought of him was a backward thought, with a sense in it of his presence just behind her again, perhaps, if she should turn her head,—­which she would not do, for all the world, to break the spell,—­when suddenly,—­face to face,—­through the car-window, she awoke to his eyes and smile.

“How did you know?” she asked, as he came in and took the seat beside her.  Then she blushed to think what she had taken for granted.

“I didn’t,” he answered; “except as a Yankee always knows things, and a cat comes down upon her feet.  I am taking a week’s holiday, and I began it two days sooner, that I might run up to see Aunt Effie before I go down to Boston to meet my father.  The steamer will be due by Saturday.  It is my first holiday since I went to Arlesbury.  I’m turning into a regular old Gradgrind, Miss Sylvie.”

Sylvie smiled at him, as if a regular old Gradgrind were just the most beautiful and praiseworthy creature a bright, hearty young fellow could turn into.

“You’d better not encourage me,” he said, shaking his head.  “It would be a dreadful thing if I should get sordid, you know.  I’m not apt to stop half way in anything; and I’m awfully in earnest now about saving up money.”

He had to stop there.  He was coming close to motives, and these he could say nothing about.

But a sudden stop, in speech as in music, is sometimes more significant than any stricken note.

Sylvie did not speak at once, either.  She was thinking what different reasons there might be, for spending or saving; how there might be hardest self-denial in most uncalculating extravagance.

When she found that they were growing awkwardly quiet, she said,—­“I suppose the right thing is to remember that there is neither virtue nor blame in just saving or not saving.”

“My father lost a good deal by the fire,” said Rodney.  “More than he thought, at first.  He is coming home sooner, in consequence.  I’m very glad I did not go abroad.  I should have been just whirled out of everything, if I had.  As it is, I’m in a place; I’ve got a lever planted.  It’s no time now for a fellow to look round for a foothold.”

“You like Arlesbury?” asked Sylvie.  “I think it must be a lovely place.”

“Why?” said Rodney, taken by surprise.

“From the piece of it you sent me in the winter.”

“Oh! those ferns?  I’m glad you liked them.  There’s something nice and plucky about those little things, isn’t there?”

It was every word he could think of to reply.  He had a provoked perception that was not altogether nice and plucky, of himself, just then.  But that was because the snow was still unlifted from him.  He was under a burden of coldness and constraint.  Somebody ought to come and take it away.  It was time.  The spring, that would not be kept back, was here.