"Mistress of the farm—and you?"
"Oh, Mr. Hurst! it breaks my heart to think of it, but father's promise was given when I did not care so much, and I let it go on without rebelling."
Ruth held out her hands, imploringly, as she said this, but Hurst turned away from her, and began to pace up and down the little parlor, while she shrunk into the recess of the window, and watched him timidly through her tears. At last he came up to her, blaming his own anger.
"This must never be, Ruth!"
"You do not know what a promise is to my father," said the girl, with piteous helplessness.
"Yes, I do know; but this is one he shall not keep."
Once more the young man took the hands she dared not offer him again, and pressed them to his lips. Then he went away full of anger and perplexity.
Ruth watched him through the window till his tall figure was lost in the windings of the path; then she ran up to her own little room, and throwing herself on the bed, wept until tears melted away her trouble, and became an exquisite pleasure. The ivy about the window shed a lovely twilight around her, and the shadows of its trembling leaves tinted the snowy whiteness of the pillow on which her cheek rested, with fairy-like embroidery. The place was like heaven to her. Here this young girl lay, thrilled heart and soul by the first passion of her womanhood. This feeling that burned on her cheek, and swelled in her bosom, was a delicious insanity. There was no hope in it—no chance for reason, but Hurst loved her, and that one thought filled the moment with joy.
With her hands clasped over her bosom, and her eyes closed in the languor of subsiding emotion, she lay as in a dream, save that her lips moved, as red rose-leaves stir when the rain falls on them, but all that they uttered was, "He loves me—he loves me."
If a thought of her father or of Richard Storms came to mar her happiness, she thrust it away, still murmuring, "He loves me. He loves me."