He was doing nothing: just staring. She came from behind the arm of reeds, half drifting along noiselessly out towards the middle of the lake, straight across his line of sight. For an instant he stared motionless, while she, holding her paddle out of the water, stared equally motionless at him. Then he seized his sketching book and began furiously to draw. She was out in the sun and had no hat on. Her hair was the strangest colour against the background of water and sky, more like a larch in autumn than anything he could think of. She seemed the vividest thing, suddenly cleaving the pallors and uncertainties of reeds and water and flecked northern sky. "Don't move," he shouted in what he supposed was German, sketching violently. "So it's you?" she called back in English, and her voice sang. "Yes, it's me all right," he said, his pencil flying. He did not recognise her. He had seen too many people in seven years to keep the foggy figure of that distant November evening in his mind. "I'm coming in," she called, digging her paddle into the water. "Sit still!" he shouted. "But I want to talk." "Sit _still_!" She sat still, watching him, unable to believe her good fortune. If he were only here again for a single day and she could only talk to him for a single hour, what a refreshment, what a delight: to talk in English; to talk to some one who had painted Judith; to talk to some one so wonderful; to talk at _all_! She was as little shy as a person stranded on a desert island would be of anybody, kings included, who should appear after years on the solitary beach. "Well?" she called, after sitting patiently for what she felt must be half an hour but which was five minutes. He did not answer, absorbed in what he was doing. She waited for what seemed another half-hour, and then turned the punt in the direction of the shore. "I'm coming in," she called; and as he did not answer she paddled towards the bay. He stared at her, his head a little on one side, as she came close. "What are you going to do?" he asked, seeing she was manoeuvring the punt into the corner under the oak-tree. "Land," said Ingeborg. He got up and caught hold of the chain fastened to the punt's nose and dragged it up the beach. "How do you do?" she said, jumping out and holding out her hand. "Mr. Ingram," she added, looking up at him, her face quite solemn with pleasure. "Well, now, but who on earth are you?" he asked, shaking her hand and staring. Her clothes, now that she was standing up, were the oddest things, recalling back numbers of _Punch_. "You're not staying at the Glambecks', and except for the Glambecks there isn't anywhere to stay." "But I told you I was the pastor's wife." "You did?" "Last time. Well, and I still am." "But when was last time?" "Don't you remember? You were staying with the Glambecks then, too." "But I haven't stayed with the Glambecks for an eternity. At least ten years."