Ida walked home through the rain very thoughtfully: but not sadly; for though it was still pelting in the uncompromising lake fashion, she was half conscious of a strange lightness of the heart, a strange brightness in herself, and even in the rain-swept view, which vaguely surprised and puzzled her.

The feeling was not vivid enough to be happiness, but it was the nearest thing to it.
And without realising it, she thought, all the way home, of Stafford Orme.

Her life had been so secluded, so solitary and friendless, that he had come into it as a sudden and unexpected flash of sunlight in a drear November day.

It seemed to her extraordinary that she should have met him so often, still more extraordinary the offer he had made that morning.

She asked herself, as she went with quick, light step along the hills, why he had done it; why he, who was rich and had so many friends--no doubt the Villa would be full of them--should find any pleasure in learning to herd cattle and count sheep, to ride about the dale with only a young girl for company.
If anyone had whispered, "It is because he prefers that young girl's society to any other's; it is because he wants to be with you, not from any desire to learn farming," she would have been more than surprised, would have received this offer of a solution of the mystery with a smile of incredulity; for there had been no candid friend to tell her that she possessed the fatal gift of beauty; that she was one of those upon whom the eyes of man cannot look without a stirring of the heart, and a quickening of the pulse.