In that doubly stagnant air the odor of the roses was so suffocating and overpowering that she had to stop to take breath. The whole garden, except a near cluster of pear-trees, was brightly illuminated by the moonlight. No one was to be seen along the length of the broad allee, strewn an inch deep with scattered red and yellow petals—colorless in the moonbeams. She was turning away, when Dick's familiar voice, but with a strange accent of entreaty in it, broke the silence. It seemed to her vaguely to come from within the pear-tree shadow.
“But we must understand one another, my darling! Tell me all. This suspense, this mystery, this brief moment of happiness, and these hours of parting and torment, are killing me!”
A slight cough broke from Aunt Viney. She had heard enough—she did not wish to hear more. The mystery was explained. Dick loved Cecily; the coyness or hesitation was not on HIS part. Some idiotic girlish caprice, quite inconsistent with what she had noticed at the mission church, was keeping Cecily silent, reserved, and exasperating to her lover. She would have a talk with the young lady, without revealing the fact that she had overheard them. She was perhaps a little hurt that affairs should have reached this point without some show of confidence to her from the young people. Dick might naturally be reticent—but Cecily!
She did not even look towards the pear-tree, but turned and walked stiffly out of the gate. As she was crossing the lane she suddenly started back in utter dismay and consternation! For Cecily, her niece,—in her own proper person,—was actually just coming OUT OF THE HOUSE!
Aunt Viney caught her wrist. “Where have you been?” she asked quickly.
“In the house,” stammered Cecily, with a frightened face.
“You have not been in the garden with Dick?” continued Aunt Viney sharply—yet with a hopeless sense of the impossibility of the suggestion.
“No, I was not even going there. I thought of just strolling down the lane.”
The girl's accents were truthful; more than that, she absolutely looked relieved by her aunt's question. “Do you want me, Aunty?” she added quickly.
“Yes—no. Run away, then—but don't go far.”