The house always irked her. Once stealing out of the school by night, she was free, stretched herself, drew a long breath, bounded and waved her arms in an ecstasy of liberty, danced around the magnolia, buried her face in the big flowers one after another and bathed it in the dew of the petals, visited every forbidden place, was particularly attracted to the water, enjoyed scratching and making her feet bleed and eating a lot of green fruit. This liberty was most precious and all through a hot summer she kept herself healthy by exercise in the moonlight. This revived her appetite, and she ended these night excursions by a forage in the kitchen. Beth had times when she hungered for solitude and for nature. Sometimes she would shut herself in her room, but more often would rove the fields and woods in ecstasy. Coming home from school, where she had long been, she had to greet the trees and fields almost before she did her parents. She had a great habit of stealing out often by the most dangerous routes over roofs, etc., at night in the moonlight, running and jumping, waving her arms, throwing herself on the ground, rolling over, walling on all-fours, turning somersaults, hugging trees, playing hide-and-seek with the shadow fairy-folk, now playing and feeling fear and running away. She invoked trees, stars, etc.
Beth's first love affair was with a bright, fair-haired, fat-faced boy, who sat near her pew Sundays. They looked at each other once during service, and she felt a glad glow in her chest spread over her, dwelt on his image, smiled, and even the next day felt a new desire to please. She watched for him to pass from school. When he appeared, "had a most delightful thrill shoot through her." The first impulse to fly was conquered; she never thought a boy beautiful before. They often met after dark, wrote; finally she grew tired of him because she could not make him feel deeply, sent him off, called him an idiot, and then soliloquized on the "most dreadful grief of her life." The latter stages of their acquaintance she occasionally used to beat him, but his attraction steadily waned. Once later, as she was suffering from a dull, irresolute feeling due to want of a companion and an object, she met a boy of seventeen, whose face, like her own, brightened as they approached. It was the first appearance of nature's mandate to mate. This friendly glance suffused her whole being with the "glory and vision of love." Religion and young men were her need. They had stolen interviews by night and many an innocent embrace and kiss, and almost died once by being caught. They planned in detail what they would do after they were married, but all was taken for granted without formal vows. Only when criticized did they ever dream of caution and concealment, and then they made elaborate parades of ignoring each other in public and fired their imaginations with thoughts of disguises, masks, etc. This passion was nipped in the bud by the boy's removal from his school.