Part 17

They stood at the door a few moments, talking aimlessly, but Ruth was watching Miss Ainslie's face, as the sunset light lay caressingly upon it. “I've had a lovely time,” she said, taking another step toward the gate.

“So have I--you'll come again, won't you?” The sweet voice was pleading now, and Ruth answered it in her inmost soul. Impulsively, she came back, threw her arms around Miss Ainslie's neck, and kissed her. “I love you,” she said, “don't you know I do?”

The quick tears filled Miss Ainslie's eyes and she smiled through the mist. “Thank you, deary,” she whispered, “it's a long time since any one has kissed me--a long time!”

Ruth turned back at the gate, to wave her hand, and even at that distance, saw that Miss Ainslie was very pale.

Winfield was waiting for her, just outside the hedge, but his presence jarred upon her strangely, and her salutation was not cordial.

“Is the lady a friend of yours?” he inquired, indifferently.

“She is,” returned Ruth; “I don't go to see my enemies--do you?”

“I don't know whether I do or not,” he said, looking at her significantly.

Her colour rose, but she replied, sharply: “For the sake of peace, let us assume that you do not.”

“Miss Thorne,” he began, as they climbed the hill, “I don't see why you don't apply something cooling to your feverish temper. You have to live with yourself all the time, you know, and, occasionally, it must be very difficult. A rag, now, wet in cold water, and tied around your neck--have you ever tried that? It's said to be very good.”

“I have one on now,” she answered, with apparent seriousness, “only you can't see it under my ribbon. It's getting dry and I think I'd better hurry home to wet it again, don't you?”

Winfield laughed joyously. “You'll do,” he said.

Before they were half up the hill, they were on good terms again. “I don't want to go home, do you?” he asked.

“Home? I have no home--I'm only a poor working girl.”

“Oh, what would this be with music! I can see it now! Ladies and gentlemen, with your kind permission, I will endeavour to give you a little song of my own composition, entitled: 'Why Has the Working Girl No Home!'”

“You haven't my permission, and you're a wretch.”

“I am,” he admitted, cheerfully, “moreover, I'm a worm in the dust.”

“I don't like worms.”

“Then you'll have to learn.”

Ruth resented his calm assumption of mastery. “You're dreadfully young,” she said; “do you think you'll ever grow up?”

“Huh!” returned Winfield, boyishly, “I'm most thirty.”

“Really? I shouldn't have thought you were of age.”

“Here's a side path, Miss Thorne,” he said, abruptly, “that seems to go down into the woods. Shall we explore? It won't be dark for an hour yet.”

They descended with some difficulty, since the way was not cleat, and came into the woods at a point not far from the log across the path. “We mustn't sit there any more,” he observed, “or we'll fight. That's where we were the other day, when you attempted to assassinate me.”

“I didn't!” exclaimed Ruth indignantly.

“That rag does seem to be pretty dry,” he said, apparently to himself. “Perhaps, when we get to the sad sea, we can wet it, and so insure comparative calm.”

She laughed, reluctantly. The path led around the hill and down from the highlands to a narrow ledge of beach that lay under the cliff. “Do you want to drown me?” she asked. “It looks very much as if you intended to, for this ledge is covered at high tide.”

“You wrong me, Miss Thorne; I have never drowned anything.”