"Well, indeed," returned the girl, "there was scarcely any path here till I came, the ferns and nut trees had quite shut it up."
"Yes," said Cardo, "I always thought it was a thicket, though I often roamed the other side of the stream. And now the dear little dell is haunted by a sweet fairy, who weaves her spells and draws me here. Oh, Valmai, what a summer it is!"
"Yes," she said, bending her head over a moon-daisy, from which she drew the petals one by one. "Loves me not," she said, as she held the last up for Cardo's inspection with a mischievous smile.
"It's a false daisy, love," he said, drawing her nearer to him, "for if my heart is not wholly and entirely yours, then such a thing as love never existed. Look once more into my eyes, cariad anwl,[2] and tell me you too feel the same."
"Oh, Cardo, what for will I say the same thing many times?"
"Because I love to hear you."
The girl leant her cheek confidingly on his breast, but when he endeavoured to draw her closer and press a kiss upon the sweet mouth, she slipped away from his arms, and, shaking her finger at him playfully, said, "No, no, one kiss is enough in a week, whatever—indeed, indeed, you shan't have more," and she eluded his grasp by slipping into the hazel copse, and looking laughingly at him through its branches. "Oh, the cross man," she said, "and the dissatisfied. Smile, then, or I won't come out again."
"Come, Valmai, darling, you tantalise me, and I begin to think you are after all a fairy or a wood nymph, or something intangible of that kind."
"Intangible, what is that?" she said, returning to his side with a little pucker on her brow. "Oh, if you begin to call me names, I must come back; but you must be good," as Cardo grasped her hand, "do you hear, and not ask for kisses and things."
"Well, I won't ask for kisses and things," said Cardo, laughing, "until—next time."