Like a robber bee, seeking honey while the garden of the world slept, the car sped humming through the silver town. Gray, shuttered houses faded upon the darkness like a dream that was spent. They were in the open country now, the white road before them, trees and hedges leaping to attention like lazy sentinels as the lamps flared on them, and throwing themselves down to rest again before the droning of the engine was gone. “‘The Island Valley of Avilion, where falls not hail, or rain, or any snow.’ Know that?” She nodded. “It sounds so peaceful, doesn’t it? Like a cold hand laid on an aching forehead. That’s the way those words have felt to me sometimes in the glare and bustle of New York. They’ve come to me when I’ve been walking up Fifth Avenue, and it’s been like a door opening into a green still orchard, somewhere inside my head.” “You’re sorry to leave it? Why should we leave it? Let’s turn back.” He slowed down the car. “Oh, you foolish! I’ve got to catch my boat to-morrow. And besides----” She paused and reflected. “Besides, I’m never so very sorry to leave anything. I’m an odd girl” (The same old phrase, “D’you think I’m an odd child, Teddy?”) “I’m never too sorry to say good-by. I want to push on and on. I’m always looking ahead.” “To what?” “Things.” She glanced away into the vagueness of the ghostly meadows. “The kind of things that people do look forward to.” He wanted to get her to talk about herself--about her past. He could make sure, then, and tell her--tell her everything without frightening her. So he said: “I don’t mean people. I mean girls. What kind of things do girls look forward to?” Had she shared his hours of remembering? Had it really been her thoughts that had touched him in that little room in Eden Row? He stooped his head nearer to listen. It seemed to him that, above the throbbing of the engine, he could hear the blood dripping in his heart. She stared into his eyes with her old suspicion--the veiled stare, half hostile, which a girl gives a man when she fears that he is going to kiss her. “Girls look forward to--what kind of things?” she echoed. “I can’t tell. The same kind of things that men look forward to, I expect. The surprise things, and--yes, the excitements, most of all.” “Like our meeting--it was a surprise thing, wasn’t it?” “I suppose so.” She slipped back her cloak from her white shoulders. “Heaps of things are surprise things like that.” It was as though she had said, “This meeting of ours--it’s of no importance.” He loved her for the way she was treating him. He knew now why she had dared to risk herself with a man who, so far as her knowledge went, was a complete stranger.