"If I do it will be your fault," she smiled, with a sidelong glance. Then she turned and began wading tentatively downstream. But the brook deepened suddenly, and she sank almost to her knees, catching her skirts up just in time. I withdrew hastily, and called back to her to come out. When I heard her on the bank, I brought her a big handkerchief for a towel, and withdrew once more, telling her to hurry and help me plan the path through the pines. In a moment or two she was by my side. We looked at each other. Her face was still flushed, but her eyes were merry. We were standing on almost the exact spot where we had first met. But now there seemed in some subtle wise a new bond of intimacy between us, a bond that had not existed before this hour. I could not analyze it, but I felt it, and I knew she felt it. But what she said was: "I told you to work till five o'clock." "It's half-past four," I answered. "Besides, you must have sent for me. Something suddenly prompted me to come out and hunt you up, at any rate." "To say I sent for you is rather--rather _forward_, under the circumstances, don't you think?" "It might be--and it might not be," I answered. "Did you have a good time?" "The best I ever had--till you spoiled it," she exclaimed. "Oh, the nice, cold brook! Now, let's build the path you spoke about once." We went back to the maples, where the ground was open, and selected a spot on the edge of the pines where the path would most naturally enter. Then we let it wind along by the brook, lopping off dead branches which were in the way, and removing one or two small trees. Once we took it across the brook, laying a line of stepping-stones, and out almost to the stone wall, where one could get a momentary glimpse of the road and over the road the blue mountains. Then we bent it in again, crossed the brook once more just above the point where she had waded, and there I rolled a large stone to the edge of the pool--"for you to sit on next time," I explained. Finally we skirted the tamarack swamp, took the path up through the fringe of pines at the southern end of the field crops, and let it come back to the house beside the hayfield wall. When we reached this wall, it was nearly six o'clock. "Now, let's just walk back through it!" she cried. "To-morrow we can bring the wheelbarrow, can't we, and pick up the litter we've made?" "I can, at any rate, while you wade," said I. She shot a little look up into my face. "I guess I'll help," she smiled.