“Oh, then,” she said, with a last hope, “I’ll leave you three young people here together.” “But,” Thair protested, “I am curious myself to know what it is about the what’s-its-name chrysanthemum.” She was already in full retreat for the house—hair, skirts, sleeves all a-flutter. The look she gave him over her shoulder was despair; but he, imperturbable, dropped into her wake, tossing his dead cigarette into the oleanders. The quality of the silence these two left behind them was of a different sort from the triangular uneasiness of the moment before. It was one with the life of the hot, green circle of garden. Something inarticulate, more simple than thought, seemed to pass between the two. The girl, still on her knees, but drawn erect, head lifted, eyes blank, looked, listening. Even thus, what height she had, what length of line! What strength in that flat white wrist, what vital color in her face, what daring in the back fling of the head! Longacre thought he had never seen her more splendid. Yet why was she grown suddenly little to him, helpless, and protectable? He looked down at the sun on her dark head. There rioted in him a reasonless desire to put his arms around it—to comfort her, to hold her! To hold her! Why, what was this? When had he ever—? Florence! The whole of the evening before came over him. That was all so sure and right! This? He was sick with himself. He was torn with a divided sense of reparation to Florence and, somehow, in some way, reparation here! Some of the stress of it, in his face looking down, met her lifted eyes. She seemed to absorb, without comprehending, his trouble. She was only suddenly conscious and uncomfortable. She got to her feet without the help of his hand, laughing nervously, biting her lips. “Oh, how—how stupid of me, Mr. Longacre—when I called you over to put my pups through their paces. We’ll do it now!” She was eagerly rolling her handkerchief into a ball. She poised it for throwing, and looked about a trifle blankly. “Why, where are they? They’re gone! Stars! Stripes! Here, boys!” She whistled. She frowned. “Oh, no, no; never mind,” Longacre began earnestly; “really, I’d rather—” She cut him short. “Then come and look at the oleanders. We’ve all sorts. Mama loves them. They _are_ lovely, but not sweet, you know. _I_ don’t love them.” She led across the open lawn toward the thicket of blazing color that hedged it on the house side. Longacre followed a pace behind, the word “sweet” repeating itself aimlessly in his head. He was vexed by the confusion of this ending to their perfect moment. He stood listlessly beside her, inattentive to her naming over the varieties, watching the quick turns, from side to side, of the long line of her throat. If such were to be his feelings, better to be away!