Alexina, sitting on the steps below him, was glad it was the Captain out here with her, rather than the others. It was like the quiet and cover of twilight, the silence of the Captain. Moving a little, she put a hand upon the arm of his chair. His closed upon it and his eyes rested on her young, beautiful profile, though she did not know it. The moon came up. The clock in the hall struck eight. Molly was lying on the sofa inside, Mrs. Leroy moving about as was her wont, straightening after the servants had gone, and innocently unsystematizing what little system they employed. Outside sat the man and the girl. There were night calls from birds and insects, but beyond these sounds the girl's heart listening, heard-- Between where the road emerged from the hummock and the gate to Nancy was a stretch of old corduroy road over a marshy strip. Elsewhere a horse's hoofs sank into sand. Willy Leroy would ride out, if he came, probably on Mr. Jonas's mare. The girl sat, all else abeyant, listening. She heard the first hoof-beat, the first clattering thud on wood. Her hand slipped from the Captain's; she sat still. She sat stiller even as Willy rode in and called halloo to the house, while his mother and Molly, and even Celeste, came out. She hardly moved as he touched her hand and went past her with the others into the house, and left her there. She did not know how long it was they came and went, Pete with the horse to the stable, Mrs. Leroy getting the boy his supper. The talk of the father and mother and son rose and fell within. She heard them closing shutters, hunting lamps, and moving up the steps. But he came out and sat on the step near her, and yet far away. They did not look toward each other. And yet he knew how she looked, fair, still, perhaps a little cold; and she knew how he looked, tanned and bronzed, yet good to see in his hunting clothes. Shy as two young, wild things they sat, and wordless. Presently he spoke, looking away from her. "Mother wrote me you were going. I came up to say good-by. They're to wait for me in camp." After that they both were silent, how long neither knew. Then the girl stood up. "It must be late," she said. "Oh," he said, "no--" "Yes," she said; "I think you'll find it is. Good-night." CHAPTER FOURTEEN In her packing Alexina had left out a muslin dress for Mrs. Leroy's evening. Going up from the hurried supper to dress, she glanced at it, then drew forth a box from a trunk and pulled the contents therefrom. The dress that came forth shimmered and gleamed and floated; it was a thing that must have enfolded any woman to beautiful lines, and have made any throat, any head, lift. It was a purchase she had been in a way ashamed of, tempted to it in a moment of weakness, urged on by Molly. Now she laid it forth and dressed with care, grave as some young priestess. Molly watched her curiously. Even at the hotel there had been occasions for only simple clothes.