"I hope so," she responded, unconscious of the selfish wish she had expressed. "If he does not, I know not what will be my fate."
I saw that I had made a mistake in assuring her that John also suffered, and I determined to correct it later on, if possible.
Dorothy was silent, and I said, "You have not told me about the golden heart."
"I will tell you," she answered. "We rode for two hours or more, and talked of the weather and the scenery, until there was nothing more to be said concerning either. Then Sir John told me of the court in London, where he has always lived, and of the queen whose hair, he says, is red, but not at all like mine. I wondered if he would speak of the beauty of my hair, but he did not. He only looked at it. Then he told me about the Scottish queen whom he once met when he was on an embassy to Edinburgh. He described her marvellous beauty, and I believe he sympathizes with her cause—that is, with her cause in Scotland. He says she has no good cause in England. He is true to our queen. Well—well he talked so interestingly that I could have listened a whole month—yes, all my life."
"I suppose you could," I said.
"Yes," she continued, "but I could not remain longer from home, and when I left him he asked me to accept a keepsake which had belonged to his mother, as a token that there should be no feud between him and me." And she drew from her bosom a golden heart studded with diamonds and pierced by a white silver arrow.
"I, of course, accepted it, then we said 'good-by,' and I put Dolcy to a gallop that she might speedily take me out of temptation."
"Have you ridden to Overhaddon for the purpose of seeing Manners many times since he gave you the heart?" I queried.
"What would you call 'many times'?" she asked, drooping her head.
"Every day?" I said interrogatively. She nodded. "Yes. But I have seen him only once since the day when he gave me the heart."