Before Moll could answer, a rich bugle-horn rang out across the park.
“The hunters’ horn!” cried Nell, gleefully. “Oh, I wish I were a man–except when one is with me”; and she threw both arms about Moll, for the want of one better to embrace. She was in her varying mood, which was one ’twixt the laughter of the lip and the tear in the eye.
“I have lost my brother!” ejaculated some one; but she heard him not.
This laconic speech came from none other than the King, who in a bantering mood had returned.
“I went one side a tree and pious James t’other; and here I am by Nelly’s terrace once again,” he muttered. “Oh, ho! wench!” His eyes had caught sight of Nell upon the terrace.
He stepped back quickly into the shadow and watched her playfully.
Nell looked longingly out into the night, and sighed heavily. She was at her wit’s end. The evening was waning, and the King, as she thought, had not come.
“Why do you sigh?” asked Moll, consolingly.
“I was only looking down the path, dear heart,” replied Nell, sadly.
“He will come,” hopefully suggested Moll, whose little heart sympathized deeply with her benefactress.