Neither of them spoke for a while. He made no move to start his reading. A gentle peace held them both.

'This is my birthday,' she announced after a bit.

He drew his gaze back from the far horizon. 'Is it indeed?' He plucked a daisy from a patch beside him, thrust it into her hair. 'Here's a nosegay for you, then, and I salute this most auspicious and blessed day. Is it the sixteenth?'

She shook her head, half-annoyed. 'The seventeenth'. 'Then we are the same age,' he said lazily.

'Really?' She was startled. 'I had thought you older.'

He shrugged his slight shoulders. 'This conversation leads nowhere'. He pulled a blade of grass and chewed the succulent tip.

' I thought you were going to read to me?' She was puzzled by him; he seemed moody, distrait.

He gestured toward his pocket, but his hand fell back limply. 'I was: a silly little tale I wrote about the Dutch country up the Hudson. But it's no good. It wouldn't interest you.'

'But it would!' she protested. 'Please'. Unconsciously she put her hand out to him, pleading. He imprisoned it gently in his, and at her sharp recoil she saw sudden amusement in his hazel eyes.

He released her hand and went on as though there had been no interruption. 'I wish I had written a poem for you, Dulcinea, but I am not at home in verse. Dull prose suits me better. Still, I can try.'

He propped himself on his elbows, staring at her with a half-humorous, half-tender intensity that discomposed her.

A daisy twinkles from her hair, like star in beech wood forest,
She is the fairest of the fair, and I would fain—fain——

He chuckled. 'I can't find a rhyme for forest, but no matter.'

He sighed and drew himself up, then leaned forward with sudden violence, crying, 'Look! Do you sec that brig down there?'

She followed his gaze to the river and nodded, astonished by the emotion in his voice.

'That's the Infanta.' He uttered the name as though it held all wonder. 'She's been to Boston, and she's bound for Spain—Spain!' He turned to Theo and spoke passionately: 'More than anything in life I wish I were aboard her. You don't know what it is to hunger and thirst for distant places, do you?'

She shook her head.

'No. Why should you? You're sheltered and happy; you're a woman! But every night I dream of the Old World. It's like a fever. England, France, Spain. The very words make enchanted music for me. I shall see them some day—before I die. And I shall write about them, so that others may feel the enchantment as I do.—At least I hope to.'

His voice fell flat. But Theo's eyes dilated, her lips parted. 'I am sure you will.'