"It was my one sin," whispers she, nervously. "Is it too bad to be forgiven?"
"I wonder what you could do, I wouldn't forgive," replies he, tenderly, "now I know you love me."
"I think you needn't have thrown my poor glove out of the window!" she says, with childish reproach. "That was very unkind, I think."
"It was brutal," says Branscombe. "But I don't believe you did love me then."
"Well, I did. You broke my heart that day. It will take you all you know"—with an adorable smile—"to mend it again."
"My own love," says Dorian, "what can I do? I would offer you mine in exchange, but, you see, you broke it many a month ago, so the bargain would do you no good. Let us both make up our minds to heal each other's wounds, and so make restitution."
"Sweet heart, I bid you be healed," says Georgie, laying her small hand, with a pretty touch of tenderest coquetry, upon his breast. And then a second silence falls upon them, that lasts even longer than the first. The moments fly; the breezes grow stronger, and shake with petulant force the waving boughs. The night is falling, and "weeps perpetual dews, and saddens Nature's scene."
"Why do you not speak?" says Georgie, after a little bit, rubbing her cheek softly against his. "What is it that you want?"
"Nothing. Don't you know that 'Silence is the perfectest herald of joy: I were but little happy, if I could say how much'?"
"How true that is! yet somehow, I always want to talk," says Mrs. Branscombe,—at which they both laugh.