Harold smiled. He took her hand and held it firmly between his own. "I remember that you are the bravest girl in the world," he said, "and that, to save a friend, you accused yourself."
"You don't know that," said Florence anxiously.
"I know that nothing could make me believe you did wrong, for you are incapable of it." Then he added earnestly: "I know, too, that I love you better than my life."
Florence looked up into his face and he must have read her answer in those gentle, brown eyes, for, without waiting for her to speak, he drew her to his side and kissed her on both cheeks. "I love you, I love you," he repeated, as he held her tightly in his strong arms; "but I must hear love spoken by those dear lips."
"I love you, Harold," she said, and the words made his heart leap with happiness.
"Then why were you so cruel to me last winter?" he asked reproachfully.
"I did not know it then," she answered. "It was not until I left the smoky city and came away into the free country air that I knew I cared for you, Harold, dear."
"I wondered you cared for me at all," he replied laughingly. "We had been friends so long that it was strange for me to speak of love."
"Yes; I always believed that love was some giant who crushes one by his mighty power," she said, "and I found he was a little rascal who stole into my heart before I knew he was anywhere about. But, O, Harold, I am so happy now."
She rested her head on his shoulder and looked up into his face again. He kissed her, and, as he did so, the wind caught Marion Sanderson's note lying in her lap, and carried it out onto the lake, where, resting on the water, it sailed slowly away toward the western shore. Harold saw it and asked what message it bore from her to Marion.