“Ma drogha, listen and be appeased. Years ago you and I played together as babies, and our fond mammas vowed we should one day mate. When I was a youth of fourteen and you a mite of seven I went away to India with my father, and at our parting promised to come back and marry you. Being in a fret because you couldn’t go also, you haughtily declined the honor, and when I offered a farewell kiss, struck me with this very little hand. Do you remember it?”
“Not I. Too young for such nonsense.”
“I do, and I also remember that in my boyish way I resolved to keep my word sooner or later, and I’ve done it.”
“We shall see, sir,” cried Amy, strongly tempted to repeat her part of the childish scene as well as her cousin, but her hand was not free, and he got the kiss without the blow.
“For eleven years we never met. You forgot me entirely, and ‘Cousin Sidney’ remained an empty name. I was in India till four years ago; since then I’ve been flying about Germany and fighting in Poland, where I nearly got my quietus.”
“My dear boy, were you wounded?”
“Bless you, yes; and very proud of it I am. I’ll show you my scars some day; but never mind that now. A little while ago I went to England, seized with a sudden desire to find my wife.”
“I admire your patience in waiting; so flattering to me, you know,” was the sharp answer.
“It looks like neglect, I confess; but I’d heard reports of your flirtations, and twice of your being engaged, so I kept away till my work was done. Was it true?”
“I never flirt, Sidney, and I was only engaged a little bit once or twice. I didn’t like it, and never mean to do so any more.”