Renmark stood motionless as a statue, an object lesson in self-control. Yates set his hat more jauntily on his head, and slipped the epoch-making coin into his trousers pocket.
“Good-by, old man,” he said. “I’ll see you later, and tell you all the particulars.”
Without waiting for the answer, for which he probably knew there would have been little use in delaying, Yates walked to the fence and sprang over it, with one hand on the top rail. Renmark stood still for some minutes, then, quietly gathering underbrush and sticks large and small, lighted a fire, and sat down on a log, with his head in his hands.
Yates walked merrily down the road, whistling “Gayly the troubadour.” Perhaps there is no moment in a man’s life when he feels the joy of being alive more keenly than when he goes to propose to a girl of whose favorable answer he is reasonably sure--unless it be the moment he walks away an accepted lover. There is a magic about a June night, with its soft, velvety darkness and its sweet, mild air laden with the perfumes of wood and field. The enchantment of the hour threw its spell over the young man, and he resolved to live a better life, and be worthy of the girl he had chosen, or, rather, that fate had chosen for him. He paused a moment, leaning over the fence near the Howard homestead, for he had not yet settled in his own mind the details of the meeting. He would not go in, for in that case he knew he would have to talk, perhaps for hours, with everyone but the person he wished to meet. If he announced himself and asked to see Margaret alone, his doing so would embarrass her at the very beginning. Yates was naturally too much of a diplomat to begin awkwardly. As he stood there, wishing chance would bring her out of the house, there appeared a light in the door-window of the room where he knew the convalescent boy lay. Margaret’s shadow formed a silhouette on the blind. Yates caught up a handful of sand, and flung it lightly against the pane. Its soft patter evidently attracted the attention of the girl, for, after a moment’s pause, the window opened carefully, while Margaret stepped quickly out and closed it, quietly standing there.
“Margaret,” whispered Yates hardly above his breath.