The dinner-bell was ringing before he finished dressing; but when he descended, Kate was still lingering out of doors.

He stood by the window watching her, as she came slowly up the lawn.

The yellow glory of the sunset made an aureole round her tinseled hair; her slender figure robed in shimmering silk; her motion floating and light.

He remembered that picture long afterwards: that Canada landscape, that blue silvery mist filling the air, and the tall, graceful girl, coming slowly homeward, with the fading yellow light in her golden hair.
After dinner, when the moon rose--a crystal-white crescent--they all left the drawing-room for the small hall and portico.

Kate, a white shawl on her shoulders, sat on the stone step, and sang, softly, "The Young May Moon;" Mr.Stanford leaned lightly against one of the stone pillars, smoking a cigar, and looking up at the blue, far-off sky, his handsome face pale and still.
"Sing 'When the Swallows Homeward Fly,' Kate," her father said.
She sang the song, softly and a little sadly, with some dim foreshadowing of trouble weighing at her heart.