“Halloo, young people, I’m here!”
Franceska would have fled, but Ivinghoe held her hand so tight that she could not wrench it away. He held it, while Clement struggled to the ground, and then said—
“Sir, there is no reason you or all the world should not know how I love this dearest, loveliest one. I came here this morning hoping that she may grant me leave to try to win her to be my own.”
He looked at Francie. Her head drooped, but she had not taken her hand away, and the look on her face was not all embarrassment, but there was a rosy sunrise dawning on it.
All Clement could say was something of “Your father.”
“He knows, he understands; I saw it in his eyes,” said Ivinghoe.
To Clement the surprise was far greater than it would have been to his sister, and the experience was almost new to him, but he could read Francie’s face well enough to say—
“My dear, I think we had better let you run in and compose yourself, or go to your aunt, while I talk to Lord Ivinghoe.”
Trembling, frightened, Francie was really glad to be released, as her lover with one pressure said—
“I shall see you again, sweetest.”