As she closed the house door, lifting her face to a cold, starlit sky from which the clouds of the day had broken away at sundown, another door a few rods down the quiet street banged loudly, and the sharp creak of rapid footsteps was immediately to be heard upon the frozen gravel. Georgiana smiled in the darkness at the coincidence of that banging door.
"Well met!" called a ringing voice. "Curious that I should break out of Mrs. Perkins's just as you came along!"
"Very curious, Jimps. How do you manage it? I stole out like a cat just to avoid such a possibility. I knew you were there."
"Did you, indeed?" inquired the owner of the voice, coming up and standing still to look at what he could see of the military-caped form. His own strongly built figure took up its position beside hers as if by right. His hand slipped lightly under her arm, and he turned her gently to face the direction in which he himself had set out. "That's like your impertinence. To pay you for it you shall come this way," he insisted. "It's only a step farther, it's not quite so hackneyed, and it will bring us out where we want to be. Look at the stars!"
"Carrying something under that cape? Give it to me, chum."
"It's only a bit of a basket, Jimps; never mind, you might spill it."
"You can't carry a bit of a basket when I'm around! Spill nothing! Hand it over."
"Terribly dictatorial to-night, aren't you?"
"Possibly. I've been bossing a lot of new hands to-day, who didn't know a pick from a gang-plough."
"But you've been outdoors every minute!" Her tone was envious.
"Every blessed minute. And you've been in, puttering over a lot of house jobs? See here, you need a run. Let's take the time to go up Harmon Hill and run down it--eh? There'll not be a soul to see."
She laughed doubtfully. "I'd love to, but--the jelly?"
"That's easy." He dropped her arm, turned aside to a clump of trees at the corner of an overgrown old place which they were passing, and deposited the little basket in the shadow. He came back and caught her arm again.
"Easy, now, up the hill. I wish the snow wasn't all gone, we'd have a farewell coast at the end of the season. But there'll undoubtedly be more. Honestly, now, George, hasn't the coasting and tramping helped you through this first winter?"