She came from the kitchen, smoothing down the sleeves of her gown and casting a last look at the table.
She removed one from each plate, and put it back in its place—neatly in its compartment in the drawer of the shining sideboard.
A MONTH later he hurried home one day from work. It was Saturday noon, and a half-holiday for him.
She was finishing her luncheon. The light in the half-darkened dining-room seemed to him mysterious and cool as he came in from the street outside.
She looked up in surprise. “You are home early!”
He glanced at her plate. “Through luncheon?”
“No. I’ve had mine—Let’s go off somewhere!”
In ten minutes she was ready and they left the house. He tucked the key in his vest pocket and they hurried across the lawn to catch an outgoing car.
As he passed the oak-tree he glanced at it with a knowing smile. He might almost have been said to wag his head at it. And he patted the pocket where the key lay.... Close beside the key were five round golden disks—little yellow disks that might at any minute turn into great gold dragons.
They left the car at a fork in the road and were in the open country; they climbed a high hill, and a hill behind the high hill, and came out at last upon a bluff overlooking miles of country.
She took off her hat and sat down with a happy sigh, lifting her face to the breeze that came across the hill.
He nodded, without speaking. His eyes were on the mountains in the distance. His heart was talking to five gold coins that lay just over it and caused it to beat in a jolly happy rhythm.
“Something nice has happened today!” he said.
“I think this is pretty nice!” Her hand swept all the reach of space about them.
“Of course. More than anything in the world,” he said after a minute.
She turned her eyes on him gravely. She looked at him a full minute. “How do you know that?” she said softly.
“I know.” He moved nearer to her, and they watched the light change and sweep in great shadows across the fields below. “You want it—more than anything in the world,” he said, speaking slowly. “I knew you did—when I took it for the lot.”
She patted the hand that lay beside her own.
“I did not want it—not so very much,” she said. “Anyway, I wanted the lot more.... And, besides, I’ve been so busy getting ready for Annabel——”