“I beg your pardon, David Lindsay; I did not know, indeed I did not mean——”
But he interrupted her by lifting her gloved fingers to his lips, bowing over them, and leading her back to the wharf. Then he went to the old flagman, and, giving him some money, engaged his services to take back Colonel de Crespigney’s boat to the Promontory pier, and leave it there.
By this time the steamer was seen puffing its way towards the wharf.
In a few minutes it drew alongside and stopped.
A plank was thrown across to them and the two passengers went on board.
A few minutes more, and the steamer was blowing her way up the bay for the mouth of the Potomac River.
“You shall never repent this if my life can help it, lady, dear—though it is for you ’a leap in the dark,’” whispered David Lindsay to the grave-faced child that leaned upon his arm, as they stood alone together on the deck of the steamboat.
“No,” said Gloria, “it is not a leap in the dark—it is a spring into liberty and light.”
CHAPTER XVII
WED
’Tis sure some dream, some vision vain,