“Then I am surprised at nothing,” said Evereld, understanding now all the ill-concealed dislike and antagonism between Sir Matthew and Ralph which had often puzzled her in past times.
“He ruined my childhood,” said Ralph hotly, “and must I now stand calmly by while he ruins the rest of my life? Evereld!”—there was a passionate appeal in his voice which stirred the very depths of her heart, “I have no right yet to ask you to be my wife—my career is only beginning—but my darling, I love you—I love you!”
He saw her flush and tremble, but she was quite silent. Her words about a girl always being able to stop that sort of thing if she chose came back to his mind.
“Are you angry with me?” he said pleadingly. “I meant to have waited for years before speaking, but I was carried away.”
She lifted her blue eyes to his, they were bright and dewy, and in her face there seemed to be the glow of sunrise.
“I am glad you didn’t wait, Ralph,” she said softly.
Whereupon Ralph had the audacity to kiss her in the full light of day as they sat under the shelter of the boat; and no one was any the wiser save an old fisherman who was blest with exceptionally long eyesight; he, with a smile, fell to thinking of his own young days, and softly sang as he filled his Sunday pipe the refrain of a sailor’s song:
“Polly, my Polly,
She is so jolly,
The bonniest lass in the world!”