“It seems too good, that is all,” she answered.
And then he talked to her, as they moved through the quiet after-light and neared the stile that brought them to the croft of Good Intent. He put his love, his hopes of a finer life, his resolutions for the future days, into words that would have moved a harder and more clear-sighted maid than Cilla. He talked once more of foreign lands, and again of this sweet Garth that lay about them, and he twined his love of Cilla throughout it all like a golden thread.
Priscilla forgot that dark corner where vague distrust span webs like a spider in a dusky room. Out of her heart she gave her love to Gaunt; and, because her heart was full, she needs must laugh.
“Reuben, we’ve not told father yet.”
“No, but will do soon. What’s the thought in your bonnie head, Cilla?”
“Why, that I must wash my face, for I’ve been crying. Father is never so tired o’ nights but he looks at me at home-coming, and he seems to know if an eyelash lies out of its own proper place.”
This side the stile, where they had halted, there was a well-spring for the cattle—a trough of stone, all but hidden long since by the mosses and the ferns that fed greedily upon the water. Priscilla dipped her kerchief in, and washed her face, and dipped the kerchief in again.
“Good night,” she said demurely, when she was satisfied that all the stains of the night’s tumult were removed.
“Ah, but not so quietly, if you please.”
So she reached up her face to him; and then he said he would wait till she was safely home, for even the home-croft held dangers when you loved a maid. And Priscilla tripped happily across the grey-dark grass, and, because she was happy, she turned at the bend of the mistal-yard and hooted like a barn-owl, to let Reuben know that she was safe.