She's a staunch little soul--I've a tremendous admiration for her--but there has never been the slightest sentiment between us, you understand." "Yes, I understand," replied Abel, and fell silent.
There was a certain magnanimity, he recognized, in Gay's effort to put things right even while he must have preferred in his heart to have them remain in the wrong.

As Molly's cousin it was hardly probable that he should care to hasten her marriage to a country miller.
"Well, I wanted you to know, that was all," said Gay in a friendly tone.
"You'll find Molly in the side-garden, so I wouldn't trouble to knock if I were you." He went on, swinging with an easy stride between the hedges of box, while Abel, passing the right wing in obedience to the directions, found Molly walking up and down in a small grassy path, which was sprinkled with snowdrops.

The "side-garden" was a ruined, over-grown square, planted in miniature box, which the elder Gay had laid out after one of his visits to Italy.

Now, with its dwindling maze and its unpruned rose-bushes, it resembled a picture which has been blotted out until the original intention of the artist is no longer discernible.

Yet the place was exquisite still.