"I am delighted to find you here," he volunteered. "It's a change. It will do you good—do us both good."
"Are you quite well?" She hesitated slightly in asking that, but he turned upon her as if the words had given him a shock of terror or dismay. In her surprise she even fancied he paled a little.
"What makes you ask that?" he cried. "What do you mean by it?"
"Why, I don't know! You look well, but not quite yourself, perhaps,—somehow different."
MacLeod took off his hat and wiped his forehead beaded with a moisture come on it, he knew, at that moment.
"I should like to ask," he said peevishly, "what in the devil you mean. Have you—heard anything?"
"No," said Rose, entirely amazed. "What is there to hear?"
They had reached the station, and she led him to the bench under a tree where lovers and their lasses assembled at dusk to see the train come in. She sat down, dispirited and still wondering, and he stood before her, all strength, now, and candor, as if he had thrown off his dubious mood and resolved to be himself.
"About the prince," he was saying. "I want you to think of him. He would give you experiences such as I never could. You'd live on velvet. You'd have art, music, a thousand things. He likes your voice. He'd insist on fostering that. You would meet men of rank, men of note—"
She interrupted him.