He did not withdraw his gaze until she had turned away again, and the encounter had been but for the briefest space, yet when it was over John Leaver’s colour had changed a little.  For the moment it was as if nobody else had been in the room—­he was only dully conscious that upon his other side Winifred Chester was addressing him, and that he must make reply.

When the company which had spent the sultry August evening upon the porch in the semi-darkness was near to breaking up, Leaver came to Charlotte and took his place beside her.  When she left the house he was with her, and the two crossed the street and went in at the hedge gate together.

“May I stay a very little while?” he asked.  And when she assented he added, “Shall we find the bench in your garden?”

“Do you know that bench?” she questioned, surprised.

“I spent many hours upon it before you came, and during the days when I was not getting about much.  I listened to the reading of two books, lounging there.  So it seems like a familiar spot to me.”

“It is my favourite resting place.  I am sorry you were driven away by my coming.  You and Miss Mathewson would have been very welcome there, all the rest of the summer, if I had known.”

“Thank you.  But I have passed the invalid stage and am not being treated as a patient.  I read for myself, at present, and tramp the country, instead of sitting on benches, anywhere.  It’s a great improvement.”

“I am very glad.”

Charlotte let him lead the way to the retreat under the apple-tree, and he proved his knowledge of it by stopping now and then to hold aside hindering branches of shrubbery, and to lift for her a certain heavily leafed bough which drooped across the path, but which would hardly have been discerned in the summer starlight by one not familiar with its position.

“It would be a pity to tear that gown,” he remarked, as the last barrier was passed.  “It occurred to me, as I looked at you to-night, that it was one I had seen you wear in Baltimore, last winter.  Am I right?”

“Last winter, and the winter before, and even the winter before that, if you had known me so long,” she answered, with a gay little laugh.  “I am so fond of it I shall not discard it until it can no longer be mended.”

“You are wise.  I believe it is hardly the attitude of the modern woman toward dress of any sort, but it might well be.  We never tire of Nature, though she wears the same costume season after season.”

“Her frocks don’t fray at the edges—­or when they do she turns them such gorgeous colours that we don’t notice they are getting worn.”

“Aren’t there some rough edges on this bench?  Please take this end; I think I recall that it is smoother than the other.”

“Thank you.  One good tear, and even Granny’s needle couldn’t make me whole again.”