“I say, will you come back and have lunch with me?” There was a frank spontaneity about the question.

Again the wistful look crept into Peter’s blue eyes. The suggestion coming suddenly was evidently somewhat of a temptation.

“I believe I’d like to,” he said lightly, “but——”

“Well?” asked Neil.

[Pg 17]

[Pg 17]

Peter shook his head. “I think not,” he said. “There are quite nine hundred and ninety-nine reasons against it, and only one for it.”

“And isn’t the one reason good enough to counteract the others?”

Peter laughed. “I fancy not. The high-road has claimed me, the hedge-side is my dining-place, the sky my roof. When it is too unkind to me, I seek shelter in a barn. I’ve struck up a kind of silent intimacy with cows, sheep, and horses. I’ve found them, indeed, quite pleased to welcome me.”

“It must be horribly lonely,” said Neil impulsively.

Peter looked away across the valley. “I wonder,” he said. “Perhaps it only appears so. Formerly I walked the earth in company, and when I got near enough to a fellow-creature to believe that I had the right to call him comrade, I suddenly realized that I was looking into the face of a complete stranger. Somehow the loneliness struck deeper home at those moments. Now—well, one just expects nothing.”

Neil glanced down at the book he was still holding in his hand.

[Pg 18]

[Pg 18]

Peter smiled.

“Love hath my name y-strike out of his sclat,

And he is strike out of my bokes clene

For ever-mo ...

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