"You know I have been threatening to come out
for a long time. I must owe you an enormous bill for pasturage,"
she picked up her purse as she spoke, "and I have come to pay my
debts. And then I wish to see my calf," and she looked into his
eyes very pleasantly.
"You don't owe me anything," replied Ambrose. "What is grass?
What do I care for grass? My mind is set on other things."
He noticed gratefully how gentle and mild she looked; there was
such a beautiful softness about her and he had had hardness enough.
He liked her ringlets: they were a novelty; and there hung around
her, in the interior of the carriage, a perfume that was unusual to
his sense and that impressed him as a reminder of her high social
position. But Ambrose reasoned that if a daughter of his neighbor
could wed a Meredith, surely he ought to be able to marry a Crane.
"If you want to see the calf," he said, but very reluctantly, "I'll
saddle my horse and we'll go over to the back pasture."
"Don't saddle your horse," objected Harriet, opening the carriage
door and moving over to the far cushion, "ride with me."
He had never ridden in a brougham, and as he got in very nervously
and awkwardly, he reversed his figure and tried to sit on the
little front seat on which lay Harriet's handkerchief and parasol.
"Don't ride backwards, Mr. Webb," suggested Harriet. "Unless you
are used to it, you are apt to have a headache," and she tapped the
cushion beside her as an invitation to him.
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