"Will you be going back to Ohio, possibly?"
"It might be that I shall go back. But it all depends. I may get a school if I pass."
She stepped forward to take leave of him. But just at that moment he thrust both hands deep into his pockets and bent his gaze intently upon the ground, his brows knit together. She waited.
"Miss Janet," he said, looking up suddenly, "I would be interested in knowing whether you pass."
"Well," she said, "I suppose I might easily let you know."
"My address is Thornton, Box 20. I get my mail every day--excepting the last few days, of course;--but I will get it again promptly as soon as I am out of this fix I am in. I don't suppose--"
"Why, are you in some sort of trouble?" she asked, interrupting him.
"Not very serious. I need a herder. I really ought to have two or three for a while now. I don't suppose, Miss Janet, there is any _doubt_ that you will pass?"
"I think," she said, a playful light now touching her features, "it is quite possible for me not to pass. I suppose I could have passed easily enough four years ago. But after I got out of the Academy, I went to live with my aunt; and women, you know, don't keep up their interest in algebra and things. This winter when Aunt Mary died, in Toledo, I came down here."
She stepped forward again and extended her hand.
He had been seeing more and more of beauty as he gazed into her eyes. The Truth was in them deeper than words. They were large gray eyes, gentle and quiet and soft as dawn; and they had that fulfilling influence which spread peace upon the waters of his soul.
"Good-bye, Mr. Brown. I am very much obliged to you."
"Well--good-bye, Miss Janet. Be sure and let me know."
She turned at once and proceeded on her way.
With her attention straight ahead, but without any landmark to go by, she went resolutely forward, and when finally she turned to look back she saw him standing just as she had left him. He did not seem to have moved. Again she put forward, widening the distance in imagination; and the next time she turned to view her work, the shack was sinking behind a billow of land. She stood now and gazed back at the flat, flowered expanse; then she turned her back upon it for the last time. One does not look long upon the gay curtain after it has closed upon the scene.