[Illustration: There she sits so attentive to her book
that his entrance has not attracted her notice]
He knows that he is expected to claim some of the privileges of the long-absent lover. He has some information as to their nature. His eyes ought to apprise him (as they do us, my boy!) of their preciousness. He is not without knowledge concerning past conduct of that type which, beginning in hard-won privileges, ripens into priceless duties, not to discharge which is insult all the more bitter because it is not to be mentioned. It is not to be denied that the tableau appeals to him; and because another woman has lately touched him in a similar way, he stands there and condemns himself for that! There is small excuse for him, I admit, sir. Her first token of his presence should have been a kiss on the snowy shoulder. You suggest the hair? Well, the hair, then, though for my part, I have always felt—— But never mind! Had it been you or I in his place——
Yes, my dear, this digression is becoming tedious. Let us proceed with the story.
Elizabeth rose with a little start of surprise, a little flutter of the bosom, and came forward with extended hands. He took them with a trembling grasp which might well have passed as evidence of fervor.
"Ah, Eugene," said she, holding him away, "it has seemed an age!"
"Yes," said he truthfully, "an eternity, almost."
"Sit down by the fire," said she, in that low voice which means so much. "You are cold."
"I am a little cold," he replied. "I must have remained outside too long."
"Y-e-s?" she returned; and after a long pause: "It doesn't seem to take long—sometimes. And the wind is in the east."
Now, when a bride-elect begins to deal in double meanings of this sort with her fiancé, the course of true love is likely to be entering on a piece of rough road-bed.