Perhaps she thought he was threatened with some kind of seizure; anyway, something about him apparently interested her enough to slowly retrace her steps.
"What is the matter, Mr. Sayre?" she asked.
"Why, that"s funny!" he said; "you know my name?"
"Yes, I know your name."
"Could--would--should--might----" he could get no farther.
"What?"
"M-might I--would it be--could you----"
"Are you trying to ask me what is my name?"
"Yes," he said; "did you think I was reciting a lesson in grammar?"
Suddenly the rare smile played delicately along the edges of her upcurled mouth.
"No," she said, "I knew you were embarra.s.sed. It wasn"t nice of me. But," and her face grew grave, "there is no use in my telling you my name."
"Why?"
"Because we shall not meet again."
"Won"t you ever let me--give me a chance--because--you know, somehow--seeing you yesterday--and to-day--this way----"
"Yes, I know what you mean."
"Do you?"
"Yes. I came back, too," she said seriously.
A strange, inexplicable tingling pervaded him.
"You came--came----"
"Yes. I should not have done it, because I saw you perfectly plainly yesterday. But--somehow I hoped--somehow----"
"What!"
"That there had been a mistake."
"You thought you knew me?"
"Oh, no. I knew perfectly well I had never before seen you. That made no difference. It wasn"t that. But I thought--hoped--I had made a mistake. In fact," she said, with a slight effort, "I was dishonest with myself. I knew all the time that it was useless. And as soon as I saw you with your cap off----"
"W-what!" he faltered.
A slight blush, perfectly distinct in her creamy skin, grew, then waned.
"I am sorry," she said. "Of course, you do not understand what I am saying; and I can not explain... . And I think I had--better--go."
"Please don"t."
"That is an added reason for my going."
"What is?"
"Your saying "please don"t.""
He looked at her, bewildered, and slowly pa.s.sed his hand across his eyes.
"Somehow," he said, "this is all like magic to me. Here in the wilderness I hear a stick crack----"
"I meant you to hear it. I could have moved without a sound."
"And, looking up, I see the most beautif--I see--you. Then I dream of you."
"Did you?"
"Every moment--between mosquitoes! And then to-day I returned, hoping."
She lost a trifle of her colour.
"Hoping--what?"
"T-t-to s-s-see you," he stammered.
"I must go," she said under her breath, almost hurriedly; "this must stop now!"
"Won"t you--can"t you--couldn"t I----"
"No. No--no--no--Mr. Sayre."
He said: "I"ve simply got to see you again. I know what I"m asking--saying--hoping--wishing--isn"t usual--conventional--advisable, b-b-but I can"t help it."
Standing there facing him she slowly shook her head.
"There is no use," she said. "It is perfectly horrid of me to have come back. I somehow was afraid--from the expression of your face yesterday----"
"Afraid of what?"
She hesitated; then, lifting her grey eyes, fearlessly: "Afraid that you might wish to see me again... . Because I felt the same way."
"Do you mean," he cried, "that I--that you--that we--Oh, Lord! I"m not eloquent, but every faltering, stuttering, stammering, fool of a word I do say means a million things----"
"Oh, I know it, Mr. Sayre. I know it. I have no business here; I must not remain----"
"If you go, you know I"ll do some absurd thing--like poking my head under water and holding it there, or walking backward off that ledge. Do you know--if you should suddenly go away now, and if that ended it----"
"Ended--what?"
"You know," he said.
She may have known, for she stood very still, with head lowered and downcast eyes. As for Sayre, what common sense he possessed had gone. The thrilling unreality of it all--the exquisite irrational, illogical intoxication of the moment--her beauty--the mystery of her--and of the still, sunlit woods, had made of them both, and the forest world around them, an enchanted dream which he was living, every breath a rapture, every heart-beat an excited summons from the occult.
"Mr. Sayre," she said, with an effort, "I shall not tell you my name; but if you ever again should happen to think of me, think of my name as the name of the girl in that poem which I heard you reciting yesterday."
"Amourette?"
"Yes. That was the name of the poem and of the girl. You may call me Amourette--when you are thinking of me alone by yourself."
"Did you like that poem?"
"Why do you ask?"
"Because--I wrote it."
"You!" She lost a little of her colour.
"Yes," he said, "I wrote it--Amourette."
"Then--then I had better go away as fast as I can," she murmured.
With an enraptured smile verging perilously upon the infatuated, if not fatuous, he repeated her name aloud; and she looked at him out of soft grey eyes that seemed at once fascinated and distressed.
"Please let me go," she said.
He was not detaining her.
"Won"t you?" she asked, pitifully.
"No, I won"t," said William Sayre, suddenly invaded by an instinct that he possessed authority in the matter. "We must talk this thing over."
"Oh, but there isn"t any use--really, truly there isn"t! Won"t you believe me?"
"No," he said as honestly as he could through the humming exaltation that sang in him until, to himself, he sounded like a beehive.
There was a fallen log all over moss behind her.
"We ought to be seated to properly consider this matter," he said.
"I must not think of it! I must go instantly."
When they were seated, and he had nearly twisted his head off trying to meet her downcast eyes, he resumed a normal and less parrot-like posture, and folded his arms portentously.
"To begin," he said, "I came here fishing. I heard a stick crack----"
She looked up.
"That was my fault. It was all my fault. I don"t know how I ever came to do it. I never did such a thing in my life. We merely heard that you and Mr. Langdon were in the woods----"
"Who heard?"
"We. Never mind the others. I"ll say that I heard you were here. And--and I took my--my net and came to--to----"
"To what?"
"To--investigate."
"Investigate what? Me?"
"Y-yes. I can"t explain. But I came, honestly, naturally, unsuspiciously. And as soon as I saw you I was quite sure that you were not what--what certain people wanted, even if you were the author of Amourette----"
[Ill.u.s.tration: ""To begin," he said, "I came here fishing.""]
"I was not what you wanted?" he repeated, bewildered.
"I mean that--that you were not what--what they required----"
"They? Who are they? And what, in Heaven"s name, did "they" require?"
"I don"t want to tell you, Mr. Sayre. All I shall say is that I knew immediately that they didn"t want you, because you are not up to the University standard. And you won"t understand that. I ought to have gone quietly away... . I don"t know why I didn"t. I was so interested in listening to you recite, and in looking at you. I loved your poem, Amourette... . And two hours slipped by----"
"You stood there in the bushes looking at me for two hours, and listening to my poem--and liking it?"
"Yes, I did... . I don"t know why... . And then, somehow, without any apparent reason, I wanted you to see me ... without any apparent reason ... and so I stepped on a dry stick... . And to-day I came back ... without any apparent reason... . I don"t know what on earth has happened to make me--make me--forget----"
"Forget what?"
"Everything--except----"
"Except what?"
She looked up at him with clear grey eyes, a trifle daunted.
"Forget everything except that I--like you, Mr. Sayre."
He said: "That is the sweetest and most fearless thing a woman ever said. I am absurdly happy over it."
She waited, looking down at her linked fingers.
"And," he said, "for the first time in all my life I have cared more for what a woman has said to me than I care for anything on earth."
There was a good deal of the poet in William Sayre.
"Do you mean it?" she asked, tremulously.