"Pray, do not be angry with me, dear Thurston."
"I am not angry that I know of, fair one; and you do me too much honor to care about my mood. Understand me once for all. I am not a Dr. Grimshaw, in any phase of that gentleman's character. I am neither the tyrant who will persecute you to exact your attention, nor yet the slave who will follow and coax and whine and wheedle for your favor. In either character I should despise myself too much," he answered, coolly.
"Thurston, you are deeply displeased, or you would not speak so, and I am very, very sorry," said Marian in a tremulous voice.
"Do not distress yourself about me, fair saint! I shall trouble you no more after this evening!"
What did he mean? What could Thurston mean? Trouble her no more after this evening! She did not understand the words, but they went through her bosom like a sword. She did not reply—she could not. She wished to say:
"Oh, Thurston, if you could read my heart—how singly it is devoted to you—how its thoughts by day, and dreams by night are filled with histories and images of what I would be, and do or suffer for you—of how faithfully I mean to love and serve you in all our coming years—you would not mistake me, and get angry, because you would know my heart." But these words Marian could not have uttered had her life depended on it.
"Go on, Marian, the moor is no safer than the forest; I shall attend you across it."
And they went on until the light from Old Field Cottage was visible.
Then Marian said:
"You had better leave me now. They are sitting up and watching for me."
"No! go on, the night is very dark. I must see you to the gate."