so glad we both came to the shore tonight and met each other.”
Leslie said nothing, and Anne was a little chilled. She had offered friendship frankly but it had not been accepted very graciously, if it had not been absolutely repelled. In silence they climbed the cliffs and walked across a pasture-field of which the feathery, bleached, wild grasses were like a carpet of creamy velvet in the moonlight. When they reached the shore lane Leslie turned.
“I go this way, Mrs. Blythe. You will come over and see me some time, won’t you?”
Anne felt as if the invitation had been thrown at her. She got the impression that Leslie Moore gave it reluctantly.
“I will come if you really want me to,” she said a little coldly.
“Oh, I do—I do,” exclaimed Leslie, with an eagerness which seemed to burst forth and beat down some restraint that had been imposed on it.
“Then I’ll come. Good-night—Leslie.”
“Good-night, Mrs. Blythe.”
Anne walked home in a brown study and poured out her tale to Gilbert.
“So Mrs. Dick Moore isn’t one of the race that knows Joseph?” said Gilbert teasingly.
“No—o—o, not exactly. And yet—I think she was one of them once, but has gone or got into exile,” said Anne musingly. “She is certainly very different
