Thereafter , every day for a week he watched unseen to see her pass his home . Once a little child was with her , clinging to her hand . No child had ever before had any part in the shy man 's dream life . But that night in the twilight the vision of the rocking-chair was a girl in a blue print dress , with a little , golden-haired shape at her knee -- a shape that lisped and prattled and called her `` mother ; '' and both of them were his . It was the next day that he failed for the first time to put flowers in the west gable . Instead , he cut a loose handful of daffodils and , looking furtively about him as if committing a crime , he laid them across the footpath under the pine . She must pass that way ; her feet would crush them if she failed to see them . Then he slipped back into his garden , half exultant , half repentant . From a safe retreat he saw her pass by and stoop to lift his flowers . Thereafter he put some in the same place every day . When Alice Reade saw the flowers she knew at once who had put them there , and divined that they were for her . She lifted them tenderly in much surprise and pleasure . She had heard all about Jasper Dale and his shyness ; but before she had heard about him she had seen him in church and liked him . She thought his face and his dark blue eyes beautiful ; she even liked the long brown hair that Carlisle people laughed at . That he was quite different from other people she had understood at once , but she thought the difference in his favour . Perhaps her sensitive nature divined and responded to the beauty in his . At least , in her eyes Jasper Dale was never a ridiculous figure . When she heard the story of the west gable , which most people disbelieved , she believed it , although she did not understand it . It invested the shy man with interest and romance . She felt that she would have liked , out of no impertinent curiosity , to solve the mystery ; she believed that it contained the key to his character .
Thereafter , every day she found XXXXX under the pine tree ; she wished to see Jasper to thank him , unaware that he watched her daily from the screen of shrubbery in his garden ; but it was some time before she found the opportunity .
child curiosity favour figure flowers home nature retreat stoop surprise