"'How,' in this part of the country, Miss Dorne, is not regarded as a question, but merely as a form of salutation," he bantered. "It was formerly employed by the Indian aborigines inhabiting these parts, who exchanged 'How's' when passing each other on the road. If I had said 'How,' you might simply have replied 'How,' and I should have been under the necessity of considering the incident closed." She laughed. "You do not wish it to be closed." "Not till I know more about it." "Very well; you shall know more. Mr. Avery brought me out to take a walk. He remembered, after bringing me as far as this, that we had not asked my father whether he had any message to be sent from here or any commission to execute; so he went back to find out. I have now waited so many minutes that I feel sure it is my father who has detained him. The imperfectly concealed meaning of what I am telling you is that I consider that Mr. Avery, by his delay, has forfeited his right. The further implication--for _I_ do imply things, Mr. Eaton--is that you cannot very well avoid offering to take the post of duty he has abandoned." "You mean walk with you?" "I do." He slipped his hand inside her arm, sustaining her slight, active body against the wind which blew strongly through the station and scattered over them snow-flakes blown from the roofs of the cars, as they walked forward along the train. Her manner had told him that she meant to ignore her resentment of the morning; but as, turning, they commenced to walk briskly up and down the platform, he found he was not wholly right in this. "You must admit, Mr. Eaton, that I am treating you very well." "In pardoning an offense where no offense was meant?" "It is partly that--that I realized no offense was meant. Partly it is because I do not pass judgment on things I do not understand. I could imagine no possible reason for your very peculiar refusal." "Not even that I might be perhaps the sort of person who ought not to be introduced into your party in quite that way?" "That least of all. Persons of that sort do not admit themselves to be such; and if I have lived for twen--I shall not tell you just how many years--the sort of life I have been obliged to live almost since I was born, without learning to judge men in that respect, I must have failed to use my opportunities." "Thank you," he returned quietly; then, as he recollected his instinctive prejudice against Avery: "However, I am not so sure." She plainly waited for him to go on, but he pretended to be concerned wholly with guiding her along the platform. "Mr. Eaton!" "Yes." "Do you know that you are a most peculiar man?" "Exactly in what way, Miss Dorne?" "In this: The ordinary man, when a woman shows any curiosity about himself, answers with a fullness and particularity and eagerness which seems to say, 'At last you have found a subject which interests me!'" "Does he?" "Is that the only reply you care to make?"