Then Katy turned her head and looked round at the little path which led through the woodland to the parapeted rock. The winding mountain road was out of sight from the Sheep Stable; a person could approach close to the little plateau without being seen. A rustle of the leaves betrayed a visitor. He walked briskly, leaping over rocks, thrusting aside branches like one whose mind is not upon the way but upon the goal. From the porch of his house he had seen Katy climbing the hill. He lifted himself to a seat on the great rock beside Katy and raised his hand to shelter his eyes while he looked over the wide prospect. "It's beautiful up here, isn't it, Katy?" Katy caught her breath. Her chance to talk had come; she seemed to be filling her lungs to make the best of it. "Yes," said she. "I'm sorry I frightened you." David did not speak very earnestly; his apology was perfunctory, as though he would just as soon have frightened her as not. "It's all right," said Katy. David looked about the little plateau. There was the little cairn; he wondered, with amusement whether he had taken all evidences of his early wickedness away. Then he looked smilingly down upon his companion, who seemed unable to make use of the air which she had taken into her lungs, but sat silently with scarlet cheeks. The cheeks flushed now a still more brilliant color. "We've met here before," said David, still smiling. Katy filled her lungs with air again. "I was _abominable_," she confessed, trembling. She began to be a little frightened. Here she had laid hands on David, had taken sides with his enemy, had thrust him violently down upon the ground, had screamed insulting things at him. She had a cold fear that he might be going to punish her for that miserable, compromising episode. But David's tone was fairly pleasant. "Yes," he agreed, "you were." Katy's head bent a little lower. She said to herself that all the education in the world would not remove the hateful stain of her association with poor Alvin. There was nothing she could say, though she had now ample opportunity; all she could do would be to remove herself as soon as possible from close proximity to this tall, gray figure, to the amused smile of these gray eyes. A moth on a pin could flutter no more feebly than Katy fluttered inwardly. "I wish you would forgive me," said she, by way of preparation for a humble departure. "But I won't," replied David. "I won't forgive you ever." Katy's heart beat more and more rapidly. Was he really going to punish her in some strange way? Was he--she glanced rapidly about, then remembered how firmly that hand beside her controlled the great horse. There was no escape unless he let her go.