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She had not closed the shutters and did not care to lean out in the storm, and so it was that, when the whistle of the ten o'clock train sounded hoarsely, she saw the little glimmer of light from Miss Ainslie's window, making a faint circle in the darkness. Half an hour later, as before, it was taken away.
Miss Ainslie went to the gate with them, her lavender scented gown rustling softly as she walked, and the moonlight making new beauty of the amethysts and pearls entwined in her hair. Ruth, aglow with happiness, put her arms around Miss Ainslie's neck and kissed her tenderly. "May I, too?" asked Winfield.
Still under these impressions, she came to the door of Mr. Ainslie's house. There were sounds of mirth and music coming from within; and so plastic is the mind when under a deep and engrossing feeling, that she found no difficulty in concentrating and modifying these sounds into joyful articulations from the very mouths of Walter Grierson and Agnes Ainslie themselves.
He followed it across the hill, and bent a score of times to pick it up, but it was a guileful squirrel and escaped with great regularity. Suddenly, with a flaunt of its bushy tail and a daring, backward glance, it scampered under the gate into Miss Ainslie's garden and Winfield laughed aloud. He had not known he was so near the other house and was about to retreat when something stopped him.
One of the front rooms, with north and east windows, was Miss Ainslie's, while the one just back of it, with south and east windows, was a sitting-room. "I keep my prettiest things up here, dear," she explained to Ruth, "for I don't want people to think I'm crazy." Ruth caught her breath as she entered the room, for rare tapestries hung on the walls and priceless rugs lay on the floor.
Far down the hill, where the road became level again, and on the left as she looked toward the village, was the white house, surrounded by a garden and a hedge, which she supposed was Miss Ainslie's. A timid chirp came from the grass, and the faint, sweet smell of growing things floated in through the open window at the other end of the room.
Impulsively, she came back, threw her arms around Miss Ainslie's neck, and kissed her. "I love you," she said, "don't you know I do?" The quick tears filled Miss Ainslie's eyes and she smiled through the mist. "Thank you, deary," she whispered, "it's a long time since any one has kissed me a long time!"
I can't bear red geraniums because a cross old woman I knew when I was a child had her yard full of them, and I shall always love the lavender," she added, softly, "because it makes me think of you." Miss Ainslie's checks flushed and her eyes shone. "Now we'll go into the house," she said, "and we'll have tea."
At the foot of the hill, on the left, was Miss Ainslie's house and garden, and directly opposite, with the width of the hill between them, was a brown house, with a lawn, but no garden except that devoted to vegetables.
Far down the hill, ghostly, but not forbidding, was Miss Ainslie's house, the garden around it lying whitely beneath the dews of dawn, and up in the attic window the light still shone, like unfounded hope in a woman's soul, harking across distant seas of misunderstanding and gloom, with its pitiful "All Hail!" III. Miss Ainslie
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