TWO STUBBORN PEOPLE Rosemary West , on her way home from a music lesson at Ingleside , turned aside to the hidden spring in Rainbow Valley . She had not been there all summer ; the beautiful little spot had no longer any allurement for her . The spirit of her young lover never came to the tryst now ; and the memories connected with John Meredith were too painful and poignant . But she had happened to glance backward up the valley and had seen Norman Douglas vaulting as airily as a stripling over the old stone dyke of the Bailey garden and thought he was on his way up the hill . If he overtook her she would have to walk home with him and she was not going to do that . So she slipped at once behind the maples of the spring , hoping he had not seen her and would pass on . But Norman had seen her and , what was more , was in pursuit of her . He had been wanting for some time to have talk with Rosemary , but she had always , so it seemed , avoided him . Rosemary had never , at any time , liked Norman Douglas very well . His bluster , his temper , his noisy hilarity , had always antagonized her . Long ago she had often wondered how Ellen could possibly be attracted to him . Norman Douglas was perfectly aware of her dislike and he chuckled over it . It never worried Norman if people did not like him . It did not even make him dislike them in return , for he took it as a kind of extorted compliment . He thought Rosemary a fine girl , and he meant to be an excellent , generous brother-in-law to her . But before he could be her brother-in-law he had to have a talk with her , so , having seen her leaving Ingleside as he stood in the doorway of a Glen store , he had straightway plunged into the valley to overtake her . Rosemary was sitting pensively on the maple seat where John Meredith had been sitting on that evening nearly a year ago . The tiny spring shimmered and dimpled under its fringe of ferns . Ruby-red gleams of sunset fell through the arching boughs . A tall clump of perfect asters grew at her side .
The little spot was as dreamy and witching and evasive XXXXX any retreat of fairies and dryads in ancient forests .
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