Sylvia thought it beautiful, possibly for the reason that her own hard sense was sometimes a strenuous burden, and in reading this she was forced to put it behind her.

However, the book did not prevent her from returning every now and then to her own life and the happenings in it.

Hence her stealthy journeys across the house and peeps at the men in the grove.

If they were nettled by a sense of feminine mystery, she reciprocated.

"What on earth did they want to stop Rose from going to see Lucy for ?" seemed to stare at her in blacker type than the characters of the book.
Presently, when she saw Horace pass the window and disappear down the road, she laid the book on the table, with a slip of paper to keep the place, and hurried out to the grove.