"When you first came to Herst for your own amusement, to pass away the hours that perhaps hung a little heavily upon your hands, or to rouse a feeling of jealousy in the heart of Luttrell, or to prove the power you have over all men by the right of your fatal beauty, you played off upon me all the pretty airs and graces, all the sweet looks and tender words, that come so easy to you, never caring what torment I might have to endure when your dainty pastime had palled upon you. Day by day I was led to believe that I was more to you than those others who also waited on your words."
"That is false,—false. Your own vanity misled you."
"I was the one singled out to escort you here, to bear your messages there. Now and again you threw me flowers, not half so honeyed as your smiles. And when you had rendered me half mad—nay, I think wholly so—for love of you, and I asked you to be my wife, you asked me in return 'what I meant,' pretending an innocent ignorance of having done anything to encourage me."
"I do not think I have done all this," says Molly, with a little gasping sigh; "but if I have I regret it. I repent it. I pray your forgiveness."
"And I will grant it on one condition. Swear you will be my wife."
She does not answer. He is so vehement that she fears to provoke him further; yet nothing but a decided refusal can be given. She raises her head and regards him with a carefully-concealed shudder, and as she does so Luttrell's fair, beautiful face—even more true than beautiful, his eyes so blue and earnest, his firm but tender mouth—rises before her. She thinks of his devotion, his deep, honest love, and without thinking any further she says, "No," with much more decided emphasis than prudence would have permitted.
"'No!'" repeats he, furiously. "Do you still defy me? Are you then so faithful to the memory of the man who cast you off? Have you, perhaps, renewed your engagement with him? If I thought that,—if I was sure of that—— Speak, and say if it be so."
The strain is too great. Molly's brave heart fails her. She gives a little gasping cry, and with it her courage disappears. Raising her face in mute appeal to the bare trees, to the rushing, comfortless wind, to the murky sky, she bursts into a storm of tears.
"Oh, if my brother were but alive," cries she, in passionate protest, "you would not dare treat me like this! Oh, John, John, where are you? It is I, your Molly Bawn. Why are you silent?"
Her sobs fall upon the chilly air. Her tears drop through her fingers down upon the brown-tinged grass, upon a foolish frozen daisy that has outlived its fellows,—upon her companion's heart!