Gorman declined the offered cigar, and again a pause in the conversation followed. At last he suddenly said, ‘She told me she thought she would marry Walpole.’
‘She told you that? How did it come about to make you such a confidence?’
‘Just this way. I was getting a little—not spooney—but attentive, and rather liked hanging after her; and in one of our walks in the wood—and there was no flirting at the time between us—she suddenly said, “I don’t think you are half a bad fellow, lieutenant.” “Thanks for the compliment,” said I coldly. She never heeded my remark, but went on, “I mean, in fact, that if you had something to live for, and somebody to care about, there is just the sort of stuff in you to make you equal to both.” Not exactly knowing what I said, and half, only half in earnest, I answered, “Why can I not have one to care for?” And I looked tenderly into her eyes as I spoke. She did not wince under my glance. Her face was calm, and her colour did not change; and she was full a minute before she said, with a faint sigh, “I suppose I shall marry Cecil Walpole.” “Do you mean,” said I, “against your will?” “Who told you I had a will, sir?” said she haughtily; “or that if I had, I should now be walking here in this wood alone with you? No, no,” added she hurriedly, “you cannot understand me. There is nothing to be offended at. Go and gather me some of those wild flowers, and we’ll talk of something else.”’
‘How like her!—how like her!’ said Dick, and then looked sad and pondered. ‘I was very near falling in love with her myself!’ said he, after a considerable pause.
‘She has a way of curing a man if he should get into such an indiscretion,’ muttered Gorman, and there was bitterness in his voice as he spoke.
‘Listen! listen to that!’ and from an open window of the house there came the prolonged cadence of a full sweet voice, as Nina was singing an Irish ballad air. ‘That’s for my father! “Kathleen Mavourneen” is one of his favourites, and she can make him cry over it.’
‘I’m not very soft-hearted,’ muttered Gorman, ‘but she gave me a sense of fulness in the throat, like choking, the other day, that I vowed to myself I’d never listen to that song again.’
‘It is not her voice—it is not the music—there is some witchery in the woman herself that does it,’ cried Dick, almost fiercely. ‘Take a walk with her in the wood, saunter down one of these alleys in the garden, and I’ll be shot if your heart will not begin to beat in another fashion, and your brain to weave all sorts of bright fancies, in which she will form the chief figure; and though you’ll be half inclined to declare your love, and swear that you cannot live without her, some terror will tell you not to break the spell of your delight, but to go on walking there at her side, and hearing her words just as though that ecstasy could last for ever.’
‘I suspect you are in love with her,’ said O’Shea dryly.
‘Not now. Not now; and I’ll take care not to have a relapse,’ said he gravely.