May listened to the poem with a rather bewildered feeling: it was so different from what she had expected. But gradually the images suggested by it took possession of her mind to the exclusion of other thoughts, and she scarcely noticed the closing lines, in the pleasure which it gave her to have that lovely morning so vividly recalled. But Hugh seemed to look for more than the pleasure she frankly expressed. He was silent for a few moments, then said in a very low tone, looking straight into her eyes, “I think that what brought the poem was my finding out, then, that I loved you!”
May was utterly taken by surprise, which indeed, overpowered every other feeling. She had not a word to say. Hugh saw how unprepared she had been for his avowal. Presently she managed to stammer out, “I thought it was—Kate!”
“I know you did, at first,” he replied, “but I thought you must have known better, now! I haven’t acted very much like a jealous lover, have I, since Mr. Winthrop appeared on the scene? And any one could see how that was going to turn out. No, May, I’m sure I’ve tried to make you understand!”
But May still sat silent, in a sort of dazed bewilderment. At last, the ludicrous aspect of the mistake—all her sincere, misplaced sympathy with Hugh in troubles which were entirely of her own imagining, struck her so vividly that she laughed outright, though her laugh had a rather hysterical note in it, and she felt that it was most inappropriate to so serious a crisis. But the personal aspect of the affair, she could not yet at all take in. Hugh laughed a little, too, reading her thoughts; but presently he said gravely enough: “Well, May, now that the mistake is cleared up, you’re not going to say you can’t care for me! Why should we not travel down the river of life together? I mean down the river to the sea,”—he added pleadingly.
“Oh, Mr. Macnab,” she replied, at last, “it is so strange to me! I don’t seem able to realize it. And I have never thought of you in that way.”
“Well, dear,” he said, gently, “I won’t hurry you; but you and I are very good friends, I think, which is an excellent beginning, and I don’t see why we couldn’t be something more. But take plenty of time to find out! I’ll promise to be patient meantime. Only, as I am going away to-morrow for a few days, I wanted to try my fate, at least, and make sure that you knew my feelings before I left—for one never knows what may turn up.”
May’s face changed when he spoke of the approaching parting, which was only, of course, the prelude to one of much longer duration, since she herself must return home as soon as the party reached Toronto, on its homeward journey. And the thought gave her a sharp pang which she could not ignore. Still, she was not sorry to hear the voices of the others not far off, and to know that this rather embarrassing tête-à-tête was nearly over. Hugh detained her a moment, however.
“I won’t press you any farther now,” he said; “only promise me that you will think about it while I am gone, and perhaps you may be able to answer me as I wish, when I come back.”
May readily promised this,—glad to have a little time to grow familiar with an idea which had seemed so strange to her at first. The rest of the walk was very quiet,—Hugh talking about indifferent things, while she found it difficult to keep up conversation at all.
Next morning it was decided that, as it was too fine a morning to lose, where there was so much to see, the whole party should drive down to the Falls of the Fraser, taking luncheon with them, that so they might not have to hurry back until the time when the three young men should have to tear themselves away from the society which, to say the truth, they were all reluctant to leave,—in order to take the steamer down again to Tadousac for the projected canoe trip on the upper Saguenay, and so on to the wilds about Lake St. John. As they were to go in calèches, however, Mrs. Sandford begged off, and Nellie Armstrong was packed into a calèche with her brother and Flora Macnab—Jack, who was familiar with the vehicle, having volunteered to act as charioteer.