It was a lovely day--a shade too hot, if anything was to be urged against it. The sun struck great shafts of golden light amid the rich green of the forest, splashing the great tree boles with bold light and shade. The air was fragrant with spruce and pine and faint, aromatic wintergreen. A hot little wind rocked the reflections in the river and blew its wimpling surface into crinkled, lace-paper fantasies.
Overhead the sky burned blue through the white-cottonballs of cloud.
Bob Martin headed the procession, Ruth at his side, and the stout widower concluded it, squiring a rather heavy-footed Mrs. Martin. Midway in the line came Mrs. Blair, and beside her, abandoning the line of young people behind the immediate leaders was a small figure in short white skirt and middy, pressing closely to her Cousin Jane's side.
It was Maria Angelina, her dark hair braided as usual about her head, her eyes a shade downcast and self-conscious, withdrawn and tight-wrapped as any prudish young bud.
But if virginal pride had urged her to flee all appearance of expectation, an equally sharp masculine reaction was withholding Johnny Byrd from any appearance of pursuit.
He went from group to group, clowning it with jokes and laughter, and only from the corners of his eyes perceiving that small figure, like a child's in its white play clothes.
For half an hour that separation endured--a half hour in which Cousin Jane told Maria Angelina all about her first mountain climb, when a girl, and the storm that had driven herself and her sister and her father and the guide to sleep in the only shelter, and of the guide's snores that were louder than the thunder--and Maria Angelina laughed somehow in the right places without taking in a word, for all the time apprehension was tightening, tightening like a violin string about to snap.
And then, when it was drawn so tight that it did not seem possible to endure any more, Johnny Byrd appeared at Ri-Ri's side, conscious-eyed and boyishly embarrassed, but managing an offhand smile.
"And is this the very first mountain you've ever climbed?" he demanded banteringly.
Gladness rushed back into the girl. She raised a face that sparkled.
"The very first," she affirmed, very much out of breath. "That is, upon the feet. In Italy we go up by diligence and there is always a hotel at the top for tea."