“I almost believe I have lost my heart to the girl,” he muttered, as he arose from the table, and at Mrs. Bryson’s suggestion, followed her out into the grounds.
“Jess, will you show Mr. Dinsmore the rose gardens?” she asked of the girl, adding, “he was very fond of them when he was a child.” Suddenly she asked: “Do you remember gathering roses from a bush when you were stung by a bee?”
“I remember the incident well,” he remarked, with a laugh, looking the good woman straight in the eye, as he uttered the glib falsehood unflinchingly, adding: “I believe I could go straight to that very bush now.”
“You have a wonderful memory,” declared the good woman, admiringly. She managed to whisper to Jess, as the girl passed her, to be more civil to their guest, and to pretend to take more interest in him for hospitality’s sake, if for nothing else—a remark to which Jess deigned no reply.
To tell the truth, she was rebelling in her innermost soul at her restraint in being gowned in a dress in which she could not do as she pleased without getting it ruined. Better a thousand times were she in her brown linsey dress, in which she could climb into her old seat in the apple tree if she liked, or roam over the dew-wet grass, with her dogs for companions, to her heart’s content.
Try as she would, she could not forget this handsome young man’s cruelty to his poor horse; how fearfully he had lashed him, every stroke being accompanied by a curse.
CHAPTER XV.
THE LOVE THAT IS SURE TO COME.
“What is love, that all the world
Talks so much about it?
What is love, that neither you