In his own mind there was only a lazy sense of pleasure, veiling the sharp edges of sensation as the September haze veiled the scene at their feet.

But Lily, though her attitude was as calm as his, was throbbing inwardly with a rush of thoughts.

There were in her at the moment two beings, one drawing deep breaths of freedom and exhilaration, the other gasping for air in a little black prison-house of fears.

But gradually the captive's gasps grew fainter, or the other paid less heed to them: the horizon expanded, the air grew stronger, and the free spirit quivered for flight.
She could not herself have explained the sense of buoyancy which seemed to lift and swing her above the sun-suffused world at her feet.

Was it love, she wondered, or a mere fortuitous combination of happy thoughts and sensations?
How much of it was owing to the spell of the perfect afternoon, the scent of the fading woods, the thought of the dulness she had fled from?
Lily had no definite experience by which to test the quality of her feelings.