“And if you had exchanged a thousand, sweet, what then?” cried Luke, proudly. “I was a jealous idiot, and ought to have known better; but it has been a lesson to me on my weakness, and now I am going to wait patiently till I can say what your uncle wishes.”
Sage was silent, for she was thinking it was her duty to tell him that, after the sad little trouble that had come between them, it would be better for them to be more distant for a time; but she could not say it with his eyes looking appealingly at her. She had felt so proud of him for his manly bearing and straightforward honesty of purpose. The words would not come, and somehow the next minute she was sobbing in his arms as he whispered those two words, but in such a tone—
“My darling!”
She started from him guiltily the next moment, and ran up-stairs, and stayed till there was a fresh crunching of wheels and the trampling of a horse’s hoofs, when she came down again to welcome her sister and her husband, John Berry—a bluff, middle-aged farmer to whom Rue had been married some five years, and they had come now to spend a few days, bringing their two little girls.
“Ah, Luke, my man of wisdom, how are you? Sage, my dear, give us a kiss. Bless you, how well you look. How am I? Hearty, and so’s Rue.”
Sage was kissing her sister affectionately the next moment, heartily glad to see her looking so rosy and well, but blushing redder as she whispered merrily—
“Oh! I am sorry we came and interrupted you. You look so guilty, Sagey. When’s it to be?”
“Not for years to come, dear,” said Sage, as she busied herself with Lotty and Totty, their two golden-haired little children, who were so wrapped up that they were, as John said, warm as toasts.
He plumped himself into a chair directly, to take one on each knee. Then Sage and Rue busied themselves in taking off pelisses and woollen leggings, and reducing the little things into a less rounded shape, while John sat as stolid and serious as a judge, evidently being very proud of his two little ones, as he was of his handsome young wife.
“And now, John, you’d like a tankard of ale, wouldn’t you?” cried Sage.