If I had been a
rich man instead of a pauper I would have kept your half-sovereign."
"I should not have enjoyed that when I found out the truth," said Miss
Vanderpoel.
"No, I suppose you wouldn't. But I should not have cared."
He was looking at her straightly and summing her up as she had summed
him up. A man and young, he did not miss a line or a tint of her chin or
cheek, shoulder, or brow, or dense, lifted hair. He had already, even
in his guise of keeper, noticed one thing, which was that while at times
her eyes were the blue of steel, sometimes they melted to the colour of
bluebells under water. They had been of this last hue when she had stood
in the sunken garden, forgetting him and crying low:
"Oh, if it were mine! If it were mine!"
He did not like American women with millions, but while he would not
have said that he liked her, he did not wish her yet to move away. And
she, too, did not wish, just yet, to move away. There was something
dramatic and absorbing in the situation. She looked over the softly
stirring grass and saw the sunshine was deepening its gold and the
shadows were growing long. It was not a habit of hers to ask questions,
but she asked one.
"Did you not like America?" was what she said.
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