The girl contemplated the distant purple hills as if Hawker were not at her side and silent.

Hawker frowned at the roadway.

Stanley, the setter, scouted the fields in a genial gallop.
At last the girl turned to him.

"Seems to me," she said, "seems to me you are dreadfully quiet this afternoon." "I am thinking about my wretched field of stubble," he answered, still frowning.
Her parasol swung about until the girl was looking up at his inscrutable profile.

"Is it, then, so important that you haven't time to talk to me ?" she asked with an air of what might have been timidity.
A smile swept the scowl from his face.