His roughness nerved her. "Then what do you want me to do?" she asked boldly. "Do? Why, come to London and marry me, of course. You've got the pluck. Or if you haven't, you're not what I thought you, and I don't want you at all. There's no time to settle anything now, and I'm off to-morrow. If I stay longer, and come over here again with Graham, they will suspect something. Meet me to-night out here--this very spot, do you see? I'll get out of the house and be over here at two o'clock. Then I'll tell you what to do." They had come to a little clearing, the entrance to a strip of planted ground which led to a gate in the walled kitchen garden, and so to the back regions of the house. She stood still and faced him. "Do you think I am going to do that?" she asked, her blue eyes looking straight into his. He had aroused her indignant opposition. What would he do now, this amazing and masterful man? He looked down at her with an odd expression in his face. It was protecting, tender, amused. "Little shy flower!" he said--he seemed to cling to that not very original metaphor--"I mustn't forget how you have been brought up, in all this shelter and luxury, must I? It is natural to you, little girl, and I'll keep you in it as far as I can. But you've got to remember what I am too. You must come out of your cotton wool sometimes. Life isn't all softness and luxury." Food and raiment! What had she been thinking of all the morning? Her eyes fell. "You can trust me, you know," he said, still speaking softly. "But you believe in daring, don't you? You must show a little yourself." "It isn't at all that I'm afraid," she said weakly. "Of course not. I know that," he answered. "It is simply that you don't do such things here." He waved his hand towards the corner of the big house, which could be seen through the trees. "But you want to get out of it, you said." Did she want to get out of it? She was tired of the dull ease. She was of the Clintons, of the women who were kept under; but there were men Clintons behind her too, men who took the ease when it came to them, but did not put it in the first place, men of courage, men of daring. It was the love of adventure in her blood that made her answer, "Perhaps I will come," and then try to dart past him. He put out his arm to stop her. "I'm not going to walk six miles here and back on the chance," he said roughly. But she was equal to him this time. "If you don't think it worth while you need not come," she said. "I won't promise." Then she was gone. He walked back slowly to the garden. Jim Graham was lying back in a basket chair, dressed in smart blue flannel and Russian leather boots, talking to Joan and Nancy. Through the open window of the library the top of the Squire's head could be seen over the back of an easy-chair. Mackenzie joined the little group under the lime. "Couldn't find her," he said shortly. "She'll turn up at tea-time," said Jim equably.