"How can this particular young man be otherwise," questioned the lover, "when the most charming girl in the world makes an appointment with him in the realms of romance?"
"Am I charming, Gerald; am I? Oh," Mavis clapped her hands, "how delightful to be told that. Say it again."
"You are charming, Mavis, and also rather reckless for laughing so loud."
"Pooh! Everything is safe, for the gates are locked and Bellaria is asleep. In all these wide gardens only you and I are awake, unless," added Mavis seriously, "you count the fairies."
"And the nightingales, and the crickets," ended Gerald, smiling.
Mavis smiled also, and they stood hand in hand like a couple of schoolchildren out on a frolic. Then "Come," she cried, loosening her grip, "you must catch me, catch me, my Prince;" and like an arrow from the bow she shot across the turf towards the archway, followed rapidly by her lover. Haskins was swift of foot, but Mavis ran like Atalanta, and was flitting about the gardens on the other side of the archway before he could range alongside.
"You are the Fairy Queen," panted Gerald, when he reached her. "I saw you spread large white wings."
"Oh no," said Mavis seriously and prosaically, "I used my legs."
"The Queen of Spain has no legs," quoted Haskins, laughing.
"Oh, how dreadful--how very, very dreadful!"