Prescott followed her into a room and made an effort to talk to her until she rose and went out as Muriel entered. The girl, to his surprise, was dressed in furs, and he felt his heart beat when she looked at him with a shy smile.
“I have been expecting you,” she said, giving him her hand.
“I wonder,” he asked gravely, “whether you can guess why I have come?”
“Yes,” she answered in a steady voice; “I think I can. But we’ll go out, Jack.”
He followed her, puzzled, but not questioning her wish, and they walked silently down the beaten trail that stretched away, a streak of grayish blue, across the glittering snow. Brilliant sunshine streamed down on them and the nipping air was wonderfully clear. When they passed a birch bluff that hid them from the house; Prescott stopped.
“Muriel,” he said, “I think you know that I love you.”
There was a warm color in her face, but for a moment she met his eyes squarely.
“Yes; I knew it some time ago, though perhaps I should have shrunk from confessing that so frankly, if it hadn’t been for last night. But why were you afraid of telling me, Jack?”
He read surrender in her face and yielding pose, and with a strange humility that tempered the wild thrill of delight he placed his arm about her. Then, as she crept closer to him, resting her head on his shoulder, every feeling was lost in a delirious sense of triumph. It was brief, for he remembered how he was handicapped, and he held her from him, looking gravely down at her.
“Dear, there is something to be said.”