My brother! I had never yet realised the relationship. My heart drummed thickly. All of a sudden I caught her eyes fixed on mine.
“Yes, I am Ira,” she said, “educated, and repentant, and come back to be punished.”
Without a word, I turned on my heel and went away through the woods.
CHAPTER IV.
A YOUNG LADY’S CHASTENING—PHASE ONE
That afternoon I was sitting glum and glowering in my lodge, while the water for my tea was boiling on the fire, when I heard a light step in the passage; and the next moment she stood before me. I had the will and the opportunity now to regard her, here in secure possession of my own. She, not I, was the intruder. But my steady inquisition failed to abash her. She was too confident of her own charms, I suppose.
“Pray forgive me, Mr Gaskett,” she said, with a twinkling civility. “I wanted to see the hermit with my own eyes.”
“And not with Lady Skene’s or Mr Pugsley’s?” I asked.
She laughed.
“You bear a grudge long.”
“I have so little else to bear out of the past,” I said.