'I only tell you because I can not control—can not help myself,' said he, humbly and sadly, and not without an emotion of pique at the ill-luck of his second venture.
'I thank you, baron, but it cannot be,' said Ellinor, shaking her pretty head decidedly.
'You cannot—love me.'
'No—not as you wish.'
'Well,' said he, after a pause, during which he had been eyeing her downcast face with an expression of disappointment and chagrin, 'be it so; but I trust you will pardon any unpleasantness my perhaps abrupt avowal has occasioned you; and I also trust that in the future you will always view me as your friend—as one who will ever be ready and eager to hold out the hand of a brother to you, Miss Ellinor. Even with that conviction I shall be happy,' he added, with a voice that certainly broke a little with emotion.
She now gave her hand frankly, and he pressed it kindly, and then, proceeding to fill with tobacco his consolatory meerschaum pipe (that dangled at his button-hole) prior to riding back to the Dammthor Wall, he said, with a sigh,
'Ach—I will get over this, no doubt!'
'As you must have got over others, no doubt,' said Ellinor, laughing now, but piqued by his philosophy, and to see that he could so calmly canvass the prospect of ceasing to care for her already. But what does it matter? Robert Wodrow had loved her as no man had ever loved her, and what had been his reward?
'Now leave me, please, baron,' she said, a little bluntly; 'the tide is far out, and I wish to sketch the creek and villa from yonder bank of dry sand ere the sun sets.'
'I must go—for parade awaits me; but must I recur to this dear subject no more?'