"'Tis here!" she said, "twenty yards down the lane. I found it in the spring--a wrennys' nest hid under the ivy on the bank. No better place. 'Tis empty now and snug as need be." He accompanied her to the spot, lit matches and examined the proposed post office. It was safe enough, for the snug, domed nest lay completely hidden under a shower of ivy, and Dinah had only discovered it by seeing the little birds pop in when they were building. Lawrence doubted; it seemed a frail receptacle for vital news; but it was dry and as safe as possible. "I'd thought to put a tobacco tin under a stone somewhere," he said, "but perhaps this couldn't be beat." He took careful note of it and marked the exact spot as well as he could in the dark. A sapling grew in the hedge opposite and he took his knife and blazed the bark behind, where only he, or Dinah, would find the cut. "There'll be a letter for you in a few days," she said, "for I know I've forgot a thousand things; and when your new plans be finished, you'll write 'em for me." "We must go slow and steady," he answered. "I've got to give Joe warning presently, and I don't mean to be out of work longer than I can help. When we know what we're going to do to the day, then I'll speak; and he won't like it none too well. He's terrible under the weather about Susan." He told her the Falcon Farm news, with details which she had not heard. "I'm sorry for Cousin Joe, but mighty glad for Susan, and I'm coming up one day to supper to congratulate her--why not?" "It will be something just to look at you across the table," he said, "but we'd best speak little to each other." Dinah grew listless as the moment for leave-taking came. Her mood was shadowed. "I know it's right and wise to keep apart now," she told him. "And I know we can never have none of the old faces round us when we're married, and none of the little pleasures that go with old friends. But I am sorry. It's small, but I am sorry." "So am I, for your sake," he answered. "And it's not small. It's natural. This is the only home you know, and the only folks you know are in it. And most are kindly and good. It only looks small against the bigger thing of being together for evermore. The time won't be long. 'Twill slip away quicker than you'll like I guess. And there's plenty of new friends waiting for us down under." "It's cruel of life," she cried. "It's hard and cruel of life to make love like ours so difficult. Open air, daylight creatures, like us, to be called to plot and scheme and hide against the frozen silliness of the world. Just the things I hate most. And now we must trust the house a little bird have made with things that we'd both be proud to shout from the church steeple!" "I know every bit what you're feeling. I feel it too--I hate it more than you do--knowing what you are. It will soon be over."