‘Well, one has only to look out of that window, and see where we are, and what lies around us on every side, to be tolerably easy on that score.’
And, as he spoke, he arose and walked out upon the terrace.
‘What, were you here all this time?’ asked he, as he saw Nina seated on the battlement, and throwing dried leaves carelessly to the wind.
‘Yes, I have been here this half-hour, perhaps longer.’
‘And heard what we have been saying within there?’
‘Some chance words reached me, but I did not follow them.’
‘Oh, it was here you were, then, Nina!’ cried Kate. ‘I am ashamed to say I did not know it.’
‘We got so warm in discussing your friend’s merits or demerits, that we parted in a sort of huff,’ said Nina. ‘I wonder was he worth quarrelling for?’
‘What should you say?’ asked Dick inquiringly, as he scanned her face.
‘In any other land, I might say he was—that is, that some interest might attach to him; but here, in Ireland, you all look so much brighter, and wittier, and more impetuous, and more out of the common than you really are, that I give up all divination of you, and own I cannot read you at all.’