THE WAR OF THE CAROLINAS

There was a daisy-meadow, that flowed brimming to the stone wall at the roadside, and on the wooded crest beyond a lamp twinkled in a house round which stole softly the unhurried, eddyless dusk. You stood at the gate, your arms folded on the top bar, your face uplifted, watching the stars and the young moon of June. I was not so old but that I marked your gown of white, your dark head, your eyes like the blue of mid-ocean sea-water in the shadow of marching billows. As my step sounded you looked up startled, a little disdainful, maybe; then you smiled gravely; but a certain dejection of attitude, a sweet wistfulness of lips and eyes, arrested and touched me; and I stole on guiltily, for who was I to intrude upon a picture so perfect, to which moon and stars were glad contributors? As I reached the crown of the road, where it dipped down to a brook that whispered your name, I paused and looked back, and you waved your hand as though dismissing me to the noisy world of men.