'Yes—but sometimes he looks like a supplanter now, and his bearing has been so unpleasant to me, especially of late,' said Florian. 'But you will wait for me, Dulcie, and not be persuaded to marry anyone else?' he added imploringly, as he clasped each of her hands in his.
'I shall wait for you, Florian, if it should be for twenty years!' exclaimed the girl, in a low and emphatic voice, scarcely considering the magnitude and peril of such a promise.
'Thank you, darling Dulcie!' said he bending down and kissing her lips with ardour, and, though on the eve of parting, they felt almost happy in the confidence of the blissful present.
'How often shall I recall this last meeting by the fallen tree, when you are far, far away from Revelstoke and—me,' said Dulcie.
'You will often come here to be reminded of me?'
'Do you think, Florian, I will require to be reminded of you?' asked the girl, with a little tone of pain in her sweet voice, as she kissed the silver locket containing his likeness, and all the sweet iteration of lover-talk, promises, and pledges went on for a time, and new hopes began to render this last interview more bearable to the young pair who were on the eve of separation, without any very distinct arrangement about correspondence in the interval of it.
The sun was setting now redly, and amid dun winter clouds, beaming on each chimney-head, on Revelstoke Church, and the leafless tree-tops his farewell radiance.
Florian took a long, long kiss from Dulcie, and with the emotion of a wrench in his heart, was gone, and she was alone.
A photo and a lock of red-golden hair were all that remained to him of her—both to be looked upon again and again, till his eyes ached, but never grew weary.
Dulcie's were very red with weeping, and the memory of that parting kiss was still hovering on her quivering lips when, in a lonely lane not far from her home, she found herself suddenly face to face with Shafto.