"Pauline is...." Guy broke off and saw another squirrel. He could not trust himself to speak of Pauline, for in this stillness of snow he felt that the lightest remark would reveal his love; and there was in nature this morning a sort of suspense that seemed to rebuke unuttered secrets. "Well, as you're walking with me to Fairfield--or nearly to Fairfield--your neglect of us shall be forgiven," Margaret promised. "Here we are out of the warm trees already. I'm glad I came this way, though I think it was rather foolish. Look how deep the snow seems on that field we've got to cross." "It isn't really," said Guy, vaulting over the fence that ran round the confines of the Abbey wood. "Ah, now you've spoilt it," she exclaimed. But Margaret did not pause a moment to regret the ruffling of that sheeted expanse and they walked on silently, watching the toes of their boots juggle with the snow. "It generally is a pity," said Guy after a while. "What?" "Impressing one's existence on so lovely and inviolate a thing as this." He indicated the untrodden field in front of them. "But look behind you," said Margaret. "Don't you think our footprints look very interesting?" "Interesting, perhaps," Guy admitted. "Yet footprints in snow never seem to be going anywhere." "Now I know quite well what you're doing," Margaret protested. "You're making that poor little wobbly track of ours try to bear all sorts of mysterious and symbolic intensities of meaning. Just because you're feeling annoyed with a sonnet, footprints in the snow mustn't lead anywhere. Why, Guy, if I told you what sentimental import my 'cello sometimes gives to a simple walk before lunch.... I mean of course when I've been playing badly." She sighed, and Guy wondered if the violoncello had been used with as little reference as a sonnet to the real cause of the mood. "Why did you sigh just now?" he asked after another minute or two of silent progress. "I wonder whether I'll tell you. No, I don't think I will. And yet...." "And yet perhaps after all you will," said Guy eagerly. "And if you do, I'll tell you something in turn." "That's no bribe," said Margaret laughing. "You foolish creature, don't you think I know what you'll tell me?" Guy shook his head. "I don't think you do. You may suspect. But for that matter, so may I. Isn't what you might have told me something that might most suitably be told on the way to Fairfield?" "You've been talking about me to Pauline," said Margaret angrily. "Never," he declared. "But you don't suppose you can have all these mysterious allusions to Richard without my guessing that his father is Vicar of Fairfield. Dear Margaret, forgive me for guessing and tell me what you were going to tell." "Have you heard I was engaged to Richard Ford?" she asked. "I heard he was in love with you."