“The rain will soon cease, for it is only a shower, then the moon will come forth from behind the clouds in a flood of silvery brightness, but the wind will take up the battle, and uproot the trees that the lightning failed to find.”
“For Heaven’s sake, why should you elect to remain where there is so much danger?” he cried, as her words were verified at that very instant by the crashing down of a giant oak almost at his feet.
“Because I love danger!” answered the girl, musingly. “I think if I had been born a boy instead of a girl, I should have gone on the high seas, and perhaps turned out a pirate captain, or something equally as romantic. I crave a life filled with excitement. I cannot understand how young girls can sit in parlors dressed up as puppets and crochet, and talk by rule. Such restraint would be simply unendurable to me. I should feel like a wild bird who has been captured from his nest in some grand old tree in a deep green wood and thrust into a gilded cage. He sees not the gilding, nor the food and drink placed in it; he sees only the cruel iron bars that hold him back from freedom and its joyousness.”
This was the very opening which Challoner desired, and he was quick to take advantage of it.
“Marry me, little Jess, and you shall live just the life you crave,” he cried, falling dramatically on his knees at her feet, and at the same instant seizing both her little clasped hands in his and covering them with hot, passionate kisses.
“You shall go where you will, do as you like. Your caprices shall be as law to me. I—I——”
“Stop!” cried Jess, drawing her hands away from him angrily. “You are cruel to spoil the beauty of the scene and the night.”
“My heart compels me to speak,” he answered, hoarsely, “the words force themselves from my heart to my lips. I can no more keep them back than I could withhold the mad torrent of waters that are dashing down the bed of yonder cataract. Listen to the story of my love, little Jess, and then blame me if you can find it in your heart to do so.”
“I do not want to hear about it now,” persisted Jess, impatiently.
He drew away from her and leaned against a tree with his arms folded across his chest and a decidedly queer expression on his face. He was struggling hard with himself to keep down his anger. Such a declaration as he had just uttered had never been known to fail in winning a feminine heart, and the idea of this girl “calling him down,” as he phrased it, for declaring himself, filled him with rage which he found difficult to master.