CHAPTER XXVII.
WINGED WORDS.
“I was afraid I had vexed your brother somehow,” said Mr. Longcluse—“I thought he seemed to meet me a little formally. I should be so sorry if I had annoyed him by any accident!”
He paused, and Miss Arden said, half laughing—“Oh, don't you know, Mr. Longcluse, that people are out of spirits sometimes, and now and then a little offended with all the world? It is nothing, of course.”
“What a fib!” whispered conscience in the young lady's pretty ear, while she smiled and blushed.
Again she raised her hand a little, expecting Mr. Longcluse's farewell. But she looked a great deal too beautiful for a farewell. Mr. Longcluse could not deny himself a minute more, and he said, “It is a year, Miss Arden, since I first saw you.”
“Is it really? I daresay.”
“Yes, at Lady May Penrose's. Yes, I remember it distinctly—so distinctly that I shall never forget any circumstance connected with it. It is exactly a year and four days. You smile, Miss Arden, because for you the event can have had no interest; for me it is different—how different I will not say.”