Both men were in full tide of talk upon the necessity for a new gymnasium, its probable cost, and the best means of raising the money, when they walked out of the pine shade into an open stretch of the road.
Soft, mountainous clouds of snowy whiteness were winging their way across the brilliant blue of the sky.

The brightness of the light had wiped all warm colour from the landscape.

The airy shadows of the clouds coursed over a scene in which the yellow of ripened fields, the green of the woods on Chellaston Mountain, and the blue of the distance, were only brought to the eye in the pale, cool tones of high light.

The road and the river ran together now as far as might be seen, the one almost pure white in its inch-deep dust, the other tumbling rapidly, a dancing mirror for the light.
The talkers went on, unmindful of dust and heat.

Then a cloud came between them and the sun, changing the hue of all things for the moment.
This lured them further.