Dora crossed the lawn, passing between the sentinel pines and crossing
the moat by the narrow footbridge. She climbed the railing with all the
ease of nineteen years and struck a bee-line across the park. She never
raised her eyes from the ground, never paused in her swinging gait, until
she reached the brown hush of the beechwood which divided the Rectory
garden from the southern extremity of the park.
Having climbed the railing again she sat on a mossy mound at the foot of
a huge beech tree. Her manner of doing so subtly indicated that she did
not only know the spot, but was in the habit of sitting there, possibly
to think. A youthful privilege of doubtful value, for, as we get busier
in life we have to do the thinking as we go along.
"Oh!" she muttered, "oh, how awful!"
A new expression had come over her face. She looked older, and all the
vivacity had suddenly left her lips.
While she was still sitting there the crisp sound of footsteps on the
fallen leaves approached through the wood.
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