Did she really care for any one else? More than one young man in Yerbury had paid her the peculiar deferential attention that asks encouragement if there is any to give, but is too truly delicate to proceed without. Then there was Jack, who understood her soul better than any one else; but had he touched her heart in a lover-like way?
She turned her clear, honest eyes to the blue overhead, as if taking Heaven for a witness. Her heart and fancy were quite free. Much as she cared for him, there was no thrill of that high sentiment in it.
In some fascinating ideal life she had seen a lover with whom she could walk down through the years, whose life would touch hers at all points, who could fathom the depths of the nature that so puzzled herself, who could measure and supply the yearning reaches of intellect; who could awake in her soul a love, strong, deep, and unquestioning, so fervent, indeed, that she would turn from all other dreams and desires to him. A young girl's ideal—perhaps it is well for the world that some women have ideals, and keep faith with them.
As for Fred, his vanity led him straight on. She tried honestly to place herself right in his estimation; but he misunderstood her, and liked her the better for the variety. She saw too, with dismay, that her aunt favored him. Her natural kindness of heart shrank from the pain of rejecting him, and to her the triumph had no pleasure. But in her anxiety and desperation she saw only this one course.
He dropped in nearly every day, he took her and Miss Barry to drive. He haunted croquet-parties, which he hated, because she accepted invitations to them. He never met Jack. Some fine sense warned the latter that an encounter in Sylvie's parlor would be uncomfortable. Yet, strange to say, sometimes when he saw the handsome fellow sauntering by, a peculiar tenderness came over him, remembering the little boy who had clung fondly to him.
An old-fashioned courtship would prove no end of a bore, Fred decided. So one day he marched over to Larch Avenue when he knew Miss Barry was alone, and laid his case before her. She received him with graceful kindliness, listened to his offer, and assented with evident pleasure. There was not a happier woman that night in all Yerbury than Miss Barry. The care and desire of her life had been justly crowned. Her good-night kiss to Sylvie was inexpressibly sweet.
Fred did not see Sylvie for the next two days, but meanwhile wrought himself into a state that he was quite sure was proper and well-bred love. Then she came to Hope Terrace, and they kept her to tea. The late, heavy dinners were dispensed with at present.
"Will you walk home, to-night, Sylvie?" asked Fred. "I feel in a walking mood."
"The slightest symptom of industry ought to be encouraged," she made answer gayly. She had been of some real service this afternoon, charmed away a fretful headache, and restored Mrs. Lawrence to a comfortable state of feeling, and was correspondingly light-hearted. Then, too, Fred had kept out of the way, and been gravely polite to her at the tea-table. She liked him in such moods.
It was a late August evening, with a small crescent moon shining softly as if its forces were well-nigh spent. The heat of the day was over, and the falling dew evolved a kind of autumnal sweetness, the flavor of ripening fruits rather than flowers. Yerbury was very quiet in the part they were to traverse. They walked under great maples where a shadowy light sifted through, and the houses looked like fragments of dreams, with here and there a lamp in a distant window. The slow wind wandered through pines and hemlocks, as if some fairy Puck had laid his finger to his lips, saying to crooning insects, "Hush, hush!" A night to dream as one went down "Lovers' Lane."