“Then spite of your words I will hope,” he cried, seizing my hand and kissing it.
Before I could remonstrate he was gone, disappearing down a grassy hollow that sloped to the little cave where his boat was lying. As he sprang into the boat, I saw, out upon the lake, lying sleepily on the water, another shallop in which a single fisherman sat with a rod in his hand. His face was toward me, and it seemed that he was gazing upon the spot where I stood. How long this solitary individual had been upon the lake I could not conjecture, but my heart told me who it was; the nearness of his presence held me in a sort of fascination, and, like one in a dream, I saw the boat glide toward the shore, and Irving spring out—a moment, and we stood face to face.
We gazed at each other breathlessly. He was much excited, and looked upon me with an air of impetuous reproach.
“It is you, then, and here, Zana—I did not believe it—I would not believe it even now, the whole thing seems false!”
“You did not expect to find me in this place, I can well believe,” was the sarcastic reply that sprang to my lips.
“No,” he said passionately, “I did not; they told me you had fled from home in the night; but that you would come here, and that I should find you thus, the thought would have seemed sacrilege. Great heavens, is there nothing trustworthy on earth?”
His passion confounded me. By his words one would have thought me an offender, not him. I did not know how to reply, his air and speech were so full of accusation. He saw this and came close to me.
“Zana,” he said, in a voice rich with wounded tenderness, “leave this place; go back to Greenhurst, Turner will receive you as if this miserable escapade had never been. This is no shelter for you; these honest old people up yonder are too good for the cheat practised upon them.”
“Cheat—I—explain, sir! your language is incomprehensible,” I cried, breathless with indignation. “If there is imposition, let him that practises it answer; this air of reproof ill becomes you, sir!”
“I may have been too rude, Zana, but the shock, the pain of finding you here—for I saw all that passed on the island, and hoping still that distance had deceived me, came to convince myself.”