Caroline awoke very early one morning in mid-July, disturbed perhaps by the light and the soft stillness. She had been in London during the week, where she had been wont to sleep late, in a darkened room. She had enjoyed her dinners and her plays and her parties, but she had a great sense of happiness and peace as she opened her eyes and realised that she was in London no longer, but in her large airy room at Abington, with the sweet fresh world of the country all about her, and no engagements of any sort before her that would prevent her from enjoying it.

The London season was over now; she had only spent the inside of three weeks away from Abington since they had first come there, and the days had seemed to go more quickly than at any time she had known. They had been contented and peaceful; she had never known a dull moment, with all the little tasks and pleasures she had found to her hand, not even when she and Barbara and Miss Waterhouse had been alone in the house together. The Saturdays and Sundays had been happy, with her father there, who seemed to belong to her now more than he had ever done, for many of her pleasures were his, and he shared her enjoyment of a life far simpler in its essence than any she had known since she had grown up, or than he had known at any time within her experience. It had been quite exciting to look forward to the Friday evenings; and the guests who sometimes came down with him had filled all her desire for society other than that of her family, or the people she saw from the houses around.

And now they were going to live the life of their home together, at least for some weeks. Her father was giving himself one of his numerous holidays, and was going to spend it entirely at Abington. Beatrix was coming home after she had gone to Cowes and before she went to Scotland. Bunting would be home for his summer holidays in a week or so. It was a delightful prospect, and gave her more pleasure than she had gained from the after-season enjoyments of previous years. She had refused an invitation to Cowes, and another to Scotland. She might go up there later, perhaps. At present she wanted nothing but Abington—to feel that she belonged there, and her days would remain the same as long as she cared to look forward.

She rose and went to the window, just to look out on the sweetness of the early morning, and the flowers and the trees. As she stood there, she saw her father come round the corner of the house. He was dressed, untidily for him, in a grey flannel suit and a scarf round his neck instead of a collar, and he carried in one hand a wooden trug full of little pots and in the other a trowel. He was walking fast, as if he had business on hand.

Something impelled her to keep silent, and she drew back a little to watch him. He went down the broad central path of the formal garden on to which her windows looked, on his way to the new rock-garden, which had been another of their spring enterprises. He had brought down the night before some big cases of rock-plants, and had evidently not been able to wait to go out and play with them.

A very soft look came over Caroline's face as she watched him. She felt maternal. Men were so like babies, with their toys. And this was such a nice toy for the dear boy, and so different from the expensive grown-up toys he had played with before. He looked so young too, with his active straight-backed figure. At a back-view, with his hat hiding his hair, he might have been taken for quite a young man. And in mind he was one, especially when he was at home at Abington. There was none of all the young men with whom Caroline had made friends whom she liked better to be with, not only because she loved him, but because with none of them could she talk so freely or receive so much in return. There was nothing in her life about which she could not or did not talk to him. Francis Parry's proposal—she had not been at ease until she had told him about it and of all that was in her mind with regard to it. Surely they were nearer together than most fathers and daughters, and always would be so.

She thought she would go down and help him with his plantings and potterings. She loved him so much that she wanted to see that look of pleasure on his face that she knew would come at the agreeable surprise she would bring him. Perhaps she would be able to steal up behind him without his seeing her, and then she would get this plain sign of his love for her and his pleasure in her unexpected appearance brought out of him suddenly. She had something more to tell him too.

She dressed and went down. She collected her garden gloves, a trowel and a trug, and then went into the empty echoing back regions where the cases of plants had been unpacked, and took out some more of the little pots. They were mostly thymes, in every creeping variety. She knew what he was going to do, then—furnish the rocky staircase, which he and two of the gardeners had built themselves, after the main part of the rock-garden had been finished and planted with professional assistance. It was rather late to be planting anything, but garden novices take little heed of seasons when they are once bitten with the planting and moving mania, and if some of the plants should be lost they could replace them before the next flowering season.

The clock in the church tower struck six as she let herself out into the dewy freshness of the garden. She had to go across the little cloistered court and all round the house, and she stood for a moment in front of it to look over the gentle undulations of the park, where the deer were feeding on the dew-drenched grass, and the bracken grew tall on the slopes sentinelled by the great beeches. She had never been able to make up her mind whether or not she liked the church and the churchyard being so near the house. At first they had seemed to detract from its privacy, and from the front windows they certainly interfered with the view of the park hollows and glades, which were so beautiful in the varied lights in which they were seen. But as the weeks had gone by she had come to take in an added sense of the community of country life from their proximity. The villagers, all of whom she now knew by sight, and some of them intimately, came here every Sunday, and seemed to come more as friends, with the church almost a part of her own home. And some of them would come up sometimes to visit their quiet graves, to put flowers on them, or just to walk about among the friends whom they had known, now resting here. The names on many of the stones were alike, and families of simple stay-at-home cottagers could be traced back for generations. The churchyard was their book of honour; some personality lingered about the most far-away name that was commemorated in it. Caroline wished that her own mother could have been buried here. It would have been sweet to have tended her grave, and to have cherished the idea that she was not cut off from the warmth of their daily life. That was how the villagers must feel about those who were buried here. She felt it herself about an old man and a little child who had died since she had come to live at Abington. They were still a part of the great family.

She went on through the formal garden and across the grass to the disused quarry which was the scene of her father's labours. It formed an ideal opportunity for rock-gardening, and was big enough to provide amusement for some time to come in gradual extension. He was half-way up the rocky stair he had made, very busy with his trowel and his watering-pot. As she came in sight of him he stood up to straighten his back, and then stepped back to consider the effect he had already made. This is one of the great pleasures of gardening, and working gardeners should not be considered slack if they occasionally indulge in it.

He turned and saw her as she crossed the grass towards him. She was not disappointed in the lightening of his face or the pleasure that her coming gave him. "Why, my darling!" he said. "I thought you'd be slumbering peacefully for another couple of hours. This is jolly!"

He gave her a warm kiss of greeting. She rubbed her soft cheek. "It's the first time I've ever known you to dress without shaving first," she said.

"Oh, I'm going to have a bath and a shave later on," he said. "This is the best time to garden. You don't mind how grubby you get, and you've got the whole world to yourself. Besides, I was dying to get these things in. How do you think it looks? Gives you an idea of what you're aiming at, doesn't it?"

He stood at the foot of the stair and surveyed his handiwork critically, with his head on one side. She had again that impulse of half-maternal love towards him, and put her arm on his shoulder to give him another kiss. "I think it's beautiful, darling," she said. "You're getting awfully clever at it. I don't think you've given the poor things enough water though. You really ought not to go planting without me."

"Well, it is rather a grind to keep on fetching water," he confessed. "I think we must get it laid on here. I'll tell you what we'll do this morning, Cara; we'll get hold of Worthing and see if we can't find a spring or a stream or something in the park that we can divert into this hollow. I've been planning it out. We might get a little waterfall, and cut out hollows in the rock for pools—have all sorts of luxuries. What do you think about it? I shouldn't do it till we'd worked it all out together."

In her mood of tenderness she was touched by his wanting her approval and connivance in his plan. "I think it would be lovely, darling," she said. "And it would give us lots to do for a long time to come."

They discussed the fascinating plan for some time, and then went on with their planting, making occasional journeys together for water, or for more pots from the cases. The sun climbed higher into the sky, and the freshness of the early morning wore off towards a hot still day. But it was still early when they had finished all that there was to be done, and the elaborate preparations of servants indoors for the washings and dressings and nibblings of uprising would not yet have begun.

"I'm going to sit down here and have a quiet pipe," said Grafton, seating himself on a jutting ledge of rock. "Room for you too, darling. We've had the best of the day. It's going to be devilish hot."

"I love the early morning," said Caroline. "But if we're going to do this very often I must make arrangements for providing a little sustenance. I'll get an electric kettle and make tea for us both. I don't think you ought to smoke, dear, before you've had something to eat."

"Oh, I've had some biscuits. Boned 'em out of the pantry. I say, old Jarvis keeps a regular little store of dainties there. There's some pÂtÉ, and all sorts of delicacies. Have some."

He took some biscuits out of his pocket, with toothsome pastes sandwiched between them, and Caroline devoured them readily, first delicately removing all traces of fluff that had attached itself to them. She was hungry and rather sleepy now, but enjoying herself exceedingly. It was almost an adventure to be awake and alive at a time when she would usually be sleeping. And certainly they had stolen the sweetest part of the day.

"Dad darling," she said, rather abruptly, after they had been silent for a time. "You know what I told you about Francis? Well, it's gone on this week, and he wants me to give him an answer now."

He came out of his reverie, which had had to do with the leading of water, and frowned a little. "What a tiresome fellow he is!" he said. "Why can't he wait?"

"He says he wouldn't mind waiting if there was anything to wait for. But he's got plenty of money, he says, to give me everything I ought to have, and he wants me. What he says is that he wants me damnably."

"Oh, it's got to that, has it? He hasn't wanted you so damnably up till now. He's been hanging about you for years."

"He says he didn't know how much he loved me before," she said, half-unwillingly. "He found it out when he saw me here. I'm much nicer in the country than I was in London."

"I didn't see much difference. You've always been much the same to him."

"Oh, he didn't mean that. I'm a different person in the country. In London I'm one of the crowd; here I'm myself. Well, I feel that, you know. I am different. He thinks I'm much nicer. Do you think I'm much nicer, Dad?"

He put his hand caressingly on her neck. "You're always just what I want you," he said. "I'm not sure I don't want you damnably too. I should be lost here without you, especially with B so much away."

"Would you, darling? Well then, that settles it. I don't want to be married yet. I want to stay here with you."

As she was dressing, later on, she wondered exactly what it was that had made her take this sudden decision, and feel a sense of freedom and lightness in having taken it. She had not intended to refuse Francis definitely when she had gone out to her father a couple of hours before; but now she was going to do so. She liked him as much as ever—or thought she did. But his importunities had troubled her a little during her week in London. They had never been such as to have caused her to reject advances for which she was not yet ready. He had made no claims upon her, but only asked for the right to make claims. Other young men from time to time in her two years' experience had not been so careful in their treatment of her; that was why she liked Francis better than any of those who had shown their admiration of her. And yet he had troubled her, with his quiet direct speech and his obvious longing for her, although she liked him so much, and had thought that in time she might give him what he wanted. Yes, she had thought she liked him well enough for that. She knew him; he was nice all through; they had much in common; they would never quarrel; he would never let her down. All that she had intended to ask her father was whether it was fair to Francis to keep him waiting, say for another year; or whether, if she did that, it was to be the engagement or the marriage that was to be thus postponed. But the question had been answered without having been asked. She did not want to marry him now, and she did not want to look forward to a future in which she might want to marry him. There was still the idea in her mind that if he asked her again, by and by, she might accept him; but for the present all she wanted was to be free, and not to have it hanging over her. So she would refuse him, definitely; what should happen in the future could be left to itself.

Oh, how nice it was to live this quiet happy country life, and to know that it would go on, at least as far as she cared to look ahead! She had the companionship in it that she liked best in the world; she had everything to make her happy. And she was completely happy as she dressed herself, more carefully than before, though a trifle languid from the early beginning she had made of the day.

A message was sent over to the Estate Office to ask Worthing if he could come up as soon as possible in the morning. He came up at about half-past ten, and brought with him a young man who had arrived the day before to study land agency with him as his pupil.

"Maurice Bradby," he introduced him all round. "He's going to live with me for a bit if we find we get on well together, and learn all I can teach him. I thought I'd bring him up and introduce him. If I die suddenly in the night—as long as I don't do it before he's learnt his job—he'd be a useful man to take my place."

Bradby was a quiet-mannered rather shy young man of about five and twenty. He was tall and somewhat loose-limbed, but with a look of activity about him. He had a lot of dark hair, not very carefully brushed, and was dressed in Norfolk jacket and knickerbockers, conspicuous neither in style nor pattern. He fell to Barbara's lot to entertain, as Caroline was too interested in the quest upon which they set across the park to leave the company of her father and Worthing. Barbara found him nice, but uninteresting. She had to support most of the conversation herself, and had almost exhausted her topics before they came to the stream in the woods which Worthing thought might be diverted into the rock-garden. Thereafter the young man fell into the background, but showed himself useful on the return journey in helping to gauge the slopes down which the water could best be led, and made one suggestion, rather diffidently, which Worthing accepted in preference to his own. Grafton said a few friendly words to him, and asked him to come and play lawn tennis in the afternoon, which invitation he gratefully but diffidently accepted.

There were two tennis courts at the Abbey, but there were a good many people to play on them that afternoon. Bradby played well, but when his turn came to sit out he hardly seemed to belong to the party, which included the Pemberton girls, and others who all knew one another, and showed it. He sat silent and awkward, until Caroline said to Barbara: "Do go and talk to Mr. Bradby; nobody's taking any trouble about him, and he's too shy to join in with the rest."

"Darling, I think you might take him on a bit yourself," expostulated Barbara. "I had him this morning, and he's frightfully dull. But I will if you like."

Caroline, disarmed by this amiability, 'took him on' herself, and finding him interested in flowers took him to see some. When she next spoke to Barbara she said: "I don't know why you say Mr. Bradby is dull. He's as keen as anything about gardening, and knows a lot too."

"Oh, of course if he likes gardening!" said Barbara. "Well, he'll be a nice little friend for you, darling. I suppose we shall have to see a good lot of him if he's going to live with Uncle Jimmy, and I dare say we can make him useful when Bunting comes home. I think he's the sort who likes to make himself useful. Otherwise, I think he's rather a bore."

That being Barbara's opinion, it fell to Caroline's lot to entertain the young man again when he came to dine, with Worthing. He was too diffident to join in the general conversation, and was indeed somewhat of a wet-blanket on the cheerful talkative company. Miss Waterhouse exerted herself to talk to him during dinner, but stayed indoors afterwards when the rest of them went out into the garden. Caroline was too kind-natured and sweet-tempered to feel annoyance at having to devote herself to him, instead of joining in a general conversation, but she did think that if he were to be constantly at the house, as he could hardly help being, she had better encourage him to make himself more at home in their company. So she tried to draw him out about himself and had her reward; for he told her all his life's history, and in such a way as to make her like him, and to hope that he would be a welcome addition to their more intimate circle, when he succeeded in throwing off his shyness.

His story was simple enough. He was the youngest son of a clergyman, who had three other sons and four daughters. They had been brought up in the country, but when Maurice was fourteen his father had been given a living in a large Midland town. His three elder brothers had obtained scholarships at good schools and afterwards at Oxford or Cambridge, and were doing well, one in the Woods and Forests Department, one as a schoolmaster, and one in journalism. He was the dunce of the family, he told Caroline, and after having been educated at the local Grammar School, he had been given a clerkship, at the age of eighteen, in a local bank. He had always hated it. He had wanted to emigrate and work with his hands, on the land, but his mother had dissuaded him. He was the only son at home, and two of the daughters had also gone out into the world. Finally a legacy had fallen to his father, which had enabled him to give his youngest son a new start in life. He was to learn land agency for a year. If he succeeded in making a living out of it after that time, he would stay in England. Otherwise, he was to be allowed his own way at last, and go out to Canada or Australia.

That was all. But he was at the very beginning of his new life now, and all ablaze, under his crust of shyness, with the joy of it. Caroline felt a most friendly sympathy with him. "I'm sure you will get on well if you are as keen as that," she said kindly. "I don't wonder at your hating being tied to an office if you love the country so. I love it too, and everything that goes on in it. And of all places in the world I love Abington. I think you're very lucky to have found Mr. Worthing to learn from, here."