But at last he decided that it would not be amiss to sound her in regard to her feelings first, before disclosing his identity to her. But ere he could proceed to do this, fate, in the shape of Lucy Caldwell, the farmer’s daughter, intervened.
She was hastening toward him, with a paper in her hand.
From the house she had seen him grasp and hold Jess’ little hand, and, fearful that he was growing overfond of her pretty visitor, joined them hurriedly, to prevent the attempt at sentimentalism, telling herself that Jess should never have the opportunity of being alone with Mr. Moore again if she could prevent it, and she would certainly be ingenious enough to head off any tête-à-têtes, with her mother’s aid.
Down the path came Lucy, with a haste unusual to her, and at her approach the gentleman dropped Jess’ hand, not altogether displeased at the interruption which had caused the words he was about to utter to remain unsaid for the present.
“Your New York papers, which you are always so anxious about, have come, and here they are, Mr. Moore,” she said, handing them to him, the heightened color flaming up into her face as he thanked her, expressing the regret that she should put herself to so much trouble as to bring them out to him.
“There is a letter for you inside the house, Jess,” she said, turning to his companion. “Uncle Abbot wrote to papa from New Orleans, and a Mrs. Bryson—I think he said she was the housekeeper at Blackheath Hall—incloses one for you, which, he wrote, was of the greatest importance, and must be delivered to you at once.”
Reluctantly, Jess followed Lucy to the farmhouse. She had little curiosity to read Mrs. Bryson’s letter. She would rather have remained outside in the golden sunshine talking to and worshiping her hero under the great oak trees.
Meanwhile, the hero in question was following the forms of the two girls with a troubled glance.
“If she knew who I was, she would hate me,” he mused, “but, not knowing, I have the deepest, truest and warmest friendship that young, girlish heart is capable of giving.”
He thought of the words he had somewhere read, “that the love which is tenderest and sweetest in a woman’s breast has its birth in friendship, gradually growing into a deeper passion.” Then again his eyes took on the look of cynical coldness so habitual to them.