"The young man is surely going stark! A girl in my condition--such a girl as I mock at an officer and a gentleman?
No, it is beyond all bounds; and this young man is suffering from the sun." "Were it not," said I angrily, "that common humanity brought me here and bids me remain for the moment, I would not endure this." "Heaven save us all!" she sighed.

"How very young is this young man who comes complaining here that he is mocked--when all I ventured was to marvel that he had found a wild rose-bud so rare and precious!" I said to myself: "Damn! Damn!" in fierce vexation, yet knew not how to take her nor how to save my dignity.

And she, with head averted, was laughing silently; I could see that, too; and never in my life had I been so flouted to my face.
"Listen to me!" I broke out bluntly.

"I know not who or what you are, why you are here, whither you are bound.

But this I do know, that beyond our pickets there is peril in these woods, and it is madness for man or maid to go alone as you do." The laughter had died out in her face.