She left me puzzled, puzzled to the last degree; but at the same time I felt that the girl had come nearer to me. She left a picture of herself a little different from that which I had hitherto possessed. Perhaps it was the hat, the wide-brimmed shadowy hat that softened her features and by taking from her height, lowered the stately carriage of her head. Perhaps it was the vague elusive sadness of her tone. Perhaps something else. She had named my mother. I wondered what my mother would think of her, with her perplexing ways, her reserve, her aloofness, the hostility which she had not stooped to veil. Often my mother had said in jest that she did not know where I should find a wife, since I looked shyly on our country belles, and she would have none of our town ladies. To which my father had answered that such fastidiousness generally ended in a milkmaid—and that he believed that the next Lady Craven would be no better. A milkmaid? Would they consider—I lost myself in wild and extravagant dreams. Blowsabella? Surely no one could be less like a Blowsabella. Or for the matter of that less like the Hartopps our neighbors, who talked of nothing but plaited bits, lived in riding coats, and romped through a country dance like so many Dulcineas del Toboso! No, no one could say that she was a milkmaid. On the other hand I doubted if she had ever seen a Panache—the latest headdress—or held cards at Loo, or squalled a bar of Sacchini’s music, or chattered down players and pit at a tragedy. She belonged to no category. She was herself, and an odd, troubling, haunting self at that! CHAPTER VII HICKORY KNOB _For I must go where lazy peace Will hide her drowsy head, And for the sport of Kings increase The number of the dead._ _But first I’ll chide thy cruel theft Can I in war delight? Who being of my heart bereft Can have no heart to fight?_ DAVENANT. I don’t know how long I had been lost in these musings when Wilmer’s return to the house put an end to them. As he crossed the veranda, carrying his gun and followed by a black boy trailing two wild turkeys after him, he turned as if he were going to join me. But he changed his mind at the last moment and paused some paces from me. “It’s a pity it’s that arm, Major,” he said. “There’s a glut of turkeys in the woods. But you’ve had other sport at home, I hear?” A little offended I put a question with my eyes. He grinned. “They’re hard to understand are women,” he said. “Beyond you and me, Major. We’ll say no more than that.”