“Good!” exclaimed Barclugh, somewhat startled. “Let’s go!” So he spurred his horse and as if by magic the two finely-bred steeds responded to the spirit of their riders and leaped into the air for a brush.
Barclugh at once was on his mettle. To be challenged for a race by the one whom he adored was the tonic needed for his soul. The somber spell that depressed him was gone as he turned and saw Mollie urge on her steed. She was a daring horse-woman; her mount was peerless. Barclugh felt the blood mount to his hair as Mollie came up and rode past and smiled roguishly at her lover as she distanced him.
Mollie reined in and turned around with her face full of animation as she asked spiritedly:
“How’s that for my Prince, Mr. Barclugh?”
“Splendid! splendid!” exclaimed Barclugh in admiration of the restless steed and the aristocratic form of Mollie, who, breathing fast, glanced at her whip with which she struck her habit, for she intuitively felt the ardor of Barclugh’s gaze and the blood mounted to her cheeks.
Here was the moment for Barclugh to ask the question uppermost in his mind. But he did not. The power to encroach upon the sacred precincts of the innermost soul of the one whom a refined nature loves is like admiring the rose and then tearing up the roots that give it being. A refined nature pauses at desecration.
Barclugh had offered himself, and Mollie had asked a month to answer. The gnawings at a man’s heart often lead him through labyrinths of impatience and indiscretion that are hard to untangle and bring him into paths that are serene and pure. But on the other hand, it often happens that the woman withholds her answer to a man’s avowal because she must satisfy the questionings of a heart that needs more than a mere avowal to convince her that the man is sincere and thoroughly in earnest.
However, the exhilaration of the gallop with Mollie had cleared the cobwebs from Barclugh’s brain. He looked upon Mollie as magnificently noble and pure. She would certainly answer him at the end of the month and if then she could not declare herself, he would know that some further proof of his devotion must be made.
“Yet after all of the fine calculations that one can make,” thought he, “love thrives without reason.”
Their way now lay through a wooded glen. The horses stepped smartly and pranced proudly as their nostrils extended out of their classic heads.