As they turned from the wood into the road, she began to whistle softly. He listened. Memory set the tune to words: “So, honey, jest play in your own backyard, Don’t mind what dem white chiles say.” “I can’t bear it.” She glanced at him sidelong. “Now, old dear, h’if I wants ter whistle, why shouldn’t I?” “It’s as though you were telling me, I don’t want you.’ You sang it in the Park that night.” “But she doesn’t want him, perhaps. There! But she does a little. Does that make him feel better? Come, let’s be sensible. You don’t recommend love by getting tragic. Take my arm and stop tickling my hand. I’m going to ask you a question.--Hasn’t there ever been another girl?” “Never, upon my----” “You needn’t be so fierce in denying. I didn’t ask you whether you’d killed anybody.” “I believe you almost wish there had been another girl” She shrugged her shoulders. “My darling mother was before me--you forgot that. But I don’t mind her.” “I think,” he said, smiling at the mysticism of the fancy, “I think I must have been loving you even then. Yes, I’m sure it was the _you_ in her, before ever I knew you, that I was loving.” She glanced at him tauntingly. “I’m afraid I’ve not been so economic; you’ll hate me because I haven’t. Shall I tell you about all my lovers?” “I won’t listen.” But she insisted. Whether it was truth or invention that she told him, he could not guess. All he knew was that, having lowered her barriers, she was carefully replacing them for her defense. Her way of doing it was to make him suspect that he was only an incident in a long procession; that all this poetry of passion, which for him had the dew on it, had been experienced by her already; that she had often watched men travel through weeks and months from trembling into boldness; that Love to her was the clown in Life’s circus and that she was proof against the greed of his mock humility. “For God’s sake, stop!” “Why?” Her tone was innocent of offense. “If it’s all true, this isn’t the time to confess it.” “Confess it! D’you think I’m ashamed, then?” She withdrew her arm. “Thank you, I can walk quite nicely by myself.” He tried to detain her. She shook him off and ran ahead. As he followed, his eyes implored her. She did not turn. Between the white cage of hedges she whistled her warning, “So, honey, jest play in your own backyard.” He wondered how any one so beautiful could be so cruel. She seemed to regard herself as a shrine at which it was ordained that men should worship, while her right was to view them with neither heat nor coldness. “Slaves of freedom”--Horace’s words came back. He caught up with her. “Why did you tell me? I didn’t mean to speak crossly.” “Didn’t you?” “I didn’t, really. I’m sorry. But why did you tell me?”