"Will you not walk with me a little way, Evelyn ?" he asked, speaking in a low voice that he might not wake the sleeper.

"It is much pleasanter out here, with the birds and the flowers." His eyes and the smile upon his lips added, "and with me." From what he had been upon a hilltop, one moonlight night eleven years before, he had become a somewhat silent, handsome gentleman, composed in manner, experienced, not unkindly, looking abroad from his apportioned mountain crag and solitary fortress upon men, and the busy ways of men, with a tolerant gaze.

That to certain of his London acquaintance he was simply the well-bred philosopher and man of letters; that in the minds of others he was associated with the peacock plumage of the world of fashion, with the flare of candles, the hot breath of gamesters, the ring of gold upon the tables; that one clique had tales to tell of a magnanimous spirit and a generous hand, while yet another grew red at mention of his name, and put to his credit much that was not creditable, was perhaps not strange.
He, like his neighbors, had many selves, and each in its turn--the scholar, the man of pleasure, the indolent, kindly, reflective self, the self of pride and cool assurance and stubborn will--took its place behind the mask, and went through its allotted part.

His self of all selves, the quiet, remote, crowned, and inscrutable _I_, sat apart, alike curious and indifferent, watched the others, and knew how little worth the while was the stir in the ant-hill.
But on a May Day, in the sunshine and the blossoming woods and the company of Mistress Evelyn Byrd, it seemed, for the moment, worth the while.

At his invitation she had taken his hand and descended from the coach.