Throwing away his cigar, he hurried through the house and the little flower-garden, a gate at the back of which opened into a wide pasture-field.

This field sloped down gently to a branch, or little stream, which ran through the middle of it, and then the ground ascended until it reached the edge of the woods.

Following the well-defined path, he looked across the little valley before him, and could see, just inside the edge of the woods--the trees and bushes being much more thinly attired than in the summer time--the form of a lady in a light-colored dress with a red scarf upon her shoulders, sometimes moving slowly, sometimes stopping.

This was Roberta, and those woods were a far better place than the exposed summit of Pine Top Hill, in which to plight his troth, if it should be so that he should be able to do it, and there were doubtless paths in those woods through which they might afterwards wander, if things should turn out propitiously.

At all events, in those woods would he settle this affair.
His intention was still strong to make a very clean breast of it to Roberta.