He put up his hand, with a gesture of self-deprecation.
"To thank me, madam?" he said, with profound deference. "Nay! you do but jest. I have done nothing to deserve so great a favour."
He bowed to her with perfect courtly grace, but she would not be gainsaid. She wished to think that he had acted thus for her.
"Sir, you wrong your own most noble deed," she said. "Will you not allow me to keep the sweet illusion, that what you did just now, you did from the kindness of your heart, and because you saw that we were all anxious ... and that ... I was unhappy..."
She looked divinely fair as she stood there beside him, with the rays of the slanting September sun touching the halo of her hair with a wand of gold. Her voice was musical and low, and there was a catch in her throat as she held out one tiny, trembling hand to him.
He took it in his own strong grasp, and kept it a prisoner therein for awhile, then he bent his slim young figure and touched her finger-tips with his lips.
"Faith, madam!" he said, "by that sweet illusion, an it dwell awhile in your memory, I am more than repaid."
In the meanwhile John had pushed open the small door which led to the inner shed.
"Quite safe, my lord!" he shouted gaily, "only friends present."
Brother and sister, regardless of all save their own joy in this averted peril, were soon locked in each other's arms. Captain Bathurst had heard her happy cry: "Philip!" had seen the look of gladness brighten her tear-dimmed eyes, and a curious feeling of wrath, which he could not explain, caused him to turn away with a frown and a sigh.