impulse came upon me, and I snatched your hand and pressed my lips upon it. Even then Ernest only turned away to hide a smile. I saw it though; I fancied it was a smile of triumph, and the thought drove me wild. He knew his security, and mocked my weakness. I felt, too, that your manner grew colder and more distant after that.
One day I came upon you suddenly amongst the shrubs; you were looking after the figure of Ernest in the distance, and there was sorrow in your face.
“He is going to leave us,” you said. “He joins his ship to-morrow: and the separation is a painful one.”
I could not keep my tone from being bitter; and you looked at me with reproachful wonder as you answered:
“Of course. He is my cousin.”
A wild hope leaped up in my heart then for a moment, but it sank as quickly. I put it down with a strong hand, feeling that it was madness. I could bear this state of things no longer.
“I shall leave you, too,” I said; “but that will be little loss.”
You gave me no answer; and the ungraciousness of my speech struck me. But your head was turned away; I thought you were still looking after Ernest, and I did leave you. I said no further good-bye to you, but went away silent and miserable, determining to put you out of my thoughts for ever: as if such a thing were in one’s own power.
For twelve long months I never saw you; I hunted, and shot, and fished; I tramped the country, high and low, but I bore about with me always the first panel of my picture; and nothing could drive out from my dreams the voice of Ernest with his “No, no, non piu,” which should have been mine.
I had been rambling for some days amongst the Scottish hills, when the fine weather changed to rain—incessant, heavy; and I was kept prisoner at a wretched inn, where there was nothing to do or to see except the fierce splashes which beat against the window and ran down it in streams. I asked the waiter if it always rained there, and though his answer was as comforting as the response of a brother waiter to a similar query—“Na, na, man, it snaws whiles,” yet he took pity upon my feckless, do-nothing condition, and brought in a pile of old newspapers. I turned them over listlessly. You know what caught my eye; the wreck of a vessel and the names of the lost: Lieutenant Ernest Haughton amongst them. I looked at the date—it was six months back. Forgive me for it, you who know how my whole heart was still clinging about you; could I help the joy that burst from my lips that moment? I did not think of Ernest, of death, or of those who mourned his loss; I thought only that you were free; and that in the possible future which stretched out before my eyes, it might be mine to make up to you for a past sorrow.
I started in the pouring rain: what did I care for that then? I never slackened my speed till I stood once more in the well-known room, and saw you. You were in mourning too: I looked at it jealously at first, thinking that six months had surely been sufficient tribute to the memory of a cousin. But my head grew dizzy as I looked at you, till your exclamation, half of pleasure, half of dismay, made me conscious of the figure I presented. Dabbled, mud-stained, a great rough fellow then as formerly, I stood before you ashamed of myself.
“If you did but know,” I stammered, “how I have longed to see you again; how I have travelled night and day without stopping—”
You broke into my speech, to insist that I needed rest and refreshment, and must have it. You did welcome me—how I blessed you for it.
By and by you spoke to me of Ernest Haughton, and I took courage to ask one daring question, which nothing but your goodness could have pronounced excusable.
“Tell me one thing,” I said. “Were you engaged to Ernest?”
The words slipped from my tongue, as though they had burnt it, and you looked at me calmly and answered “No.”
But then I believed in my secret heart that it was only the word engagement which had been wanting. I hoped, however, from the calmness of your answer, that you were learning to forget; I must give you time for that. You would have talked on about Ernest, his friends, and the shock his death had been, but I changed the subject, and avoided it studiously. I wanted him to be far away in the past, not talked of, but forgotten. I flattered myself that I did not care what he had been to you once, now that it was all over, and I could not help my jealous nature, nor the madness which stung me at times when I heard you pronounce his name with—as I fancied—such regretful tenderness.
I curbed down my impatience for a while with the reflection that I must let you forget him; and then—remember it—I told my tale.
You seemed touched; I saw your lips tremble, but no word came from them. Then I went on, following up my own ideas and acting upon them. I said I did not care for first love—which was false—I wanted you to give me what you could; in time it would be your whole heart, I trusted; and if some passing fancy had ever bound you to another, let it be forgotten. So that it was really past, I would never rake up its ashes.
You turned to me smiling, and asked me falteringly, “Was I less exacting than others, that I promised so readily to be satisfied with a worn-out heart?”
Satisfied! No, I warned you of my jealous nature, but the music of a hundred joy-bells rang in my ears and stumbled from my tongue as I did so. Vehement and passionate always, I scarcely think the old fire has died out of me even yet. At that time I might surely, in my security, have spoken of your cousin, and learnt the depth of your sorrow for him, but I would not. The sting which his name held even then terrified me, and I avoided all mention of him.
You seemed, too, so quiet and undisturbed, while the excitement of my new happiness was filling me with exuberant life, that I could not help at times tormenting myself with the reflec-