The next morning, although he was up early, he did not see her until eleven o’clock. Then he came upon her as she quitted the wing in which had been laid the crippled overseer. All around was an old, formal garden, the day grey pearl, a few coloured leaves falling. The two sat upon the step of a summer-house, and at first they talked of the recession of the water and the plantation round which had kept her through the morning. Then, answering her smiling questions, he told her of his home and family, lightly and readily, meaning that she should know how to place him. After this the note of last evening came back, and with its thrilling sound the two fell silent, sitting in the Southern sunshine, gazing past the garden upon the lessening crescent of the flood. Late in the afternoon, as he sat in a dream before an excellent old collection of books, the door opened and she appeared on the threshold, about her the cloak of the other night. He rose, laying down an unopened book. “I am going,” she said, “to walk down the avenue to look at the levee.” They walked beneath the slant rays, through the deepening shade. Before them was the great river; turn the head and they saw, beyond the rising ground and the house gleaming from the trees, the encroaching backwater, the two horns of that sickle all but touching the main levee. When they came upon this, out of the long avenue, the cypresses behind them were black against the lit west, unearthly still and dark against the gold. The river, too, was gold, a red gold, deep and very wide and swift. They stood upon the levee, and even his unaccustomed eye saw that the danger and strain of the other night was much lessened, but that always there was danger.—“The price of safety hereabouts is vigilance.” “Yes. To keep up the levees. Now and then, before the War, we heard of catastrophes—though they were mostly down the river. Then, up and down, everything would be strengthened. But now—neglect because we cannot help it, and tremor in the night-time! Below Baton Rouge the Yankees have broken the levees. Oh, the distress, the loss! If Port Hudson falls and they come up the river, or Vicksburg and they come down it, Cape Jessamine will be as others.” She drew her cloak close for a moment, then loosened it, held her head high and laughed. “But we shall win, and it will not happen!... If we walk to the bend yonder, we shall see far, far!—and it is lovely.” At the bend was a bench beneath a live-oak. The two sat down and looked forth upon vast levels and shining loops of the river. From the boughs above hung Spanish moss, long and dark, like cobwebs of all time, like mouldered banners of some contest long since fought out. The air was an amethyst profound.