Can she be one of them ? No , it is a flagrant waste of time and gray matter supposing it . That girl could n't be a Florrie or a Melissa or an Emma , while Jennie May is completely out of the question . Well , there is some bewitchment in the affair . Of that I 'm convinced . So I 'd better forget all about it . '' But Eric found that it was impossible to forget all about it . The more he tried to forget , the more keenly and insistently he remembered . The girl 's exquisite face haunted him and the mystery of her tantalized him . True , he knew that , in all likelihood , he might easily solve the problem by asking the Williamsons about her . But somehow , to his own surprise , he found that he shrank from doing this . He felt that it was impossible to ask Robert Williamson and probably have the girl 's name overflowed in a stream of petty gossip concerning her and all her antecedents and collaterals to the third and fourth generation . If he had to ask any one it should be Mrs. Williamson ; but he meant to find out the secret for himself if it were at all possible . He had planned to go to the harbour the next evening . One of the lobstermen had promised to take him out cod-fishing . But instead he wandered southwest over the fields again . He found the orchard easily -- he had half expected NOT to find it . It was still the same fragrant , grassy , wind-haunted spot . But it had no occupant and the violin bow was gone from the old bench . `` Perhaps she tiptoed back here for it by the light o ' the moon , '' thought Eric , pleasing his fancy by the vision of a lithe , girlish figure stealing with a beating heart through mingled shadow and moonshine .
`` I wonder if she will possibly come this evening , or XXXXX I have frightened her away for ever .
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