What if he should really fall in love with her, and propose? She would of course accept him. No girl in her right mind would refuse Fred Lansing. The thought was like wormwood, and he found himself growing more and more jealous of Fred, who was going to call on Louie that afternoon, and his jealousy increased her value tenfold. He had always liked her better than any girl he knew. In fact, she was the only girl he had ever cared for at all. But, then, his knowledge of girls was rather limited. Those from the city who had been at the party had about them a different air from Louie, it was true, but were not half as pretty and winsome, nor had the whole of them received as much attention as she had, especially from Fred—confound him! He was never known to notice a girl before, or scarcely look at one, and he would have appropriated Louie entirely if he had not interfered and asserted his rights.
These and similar thoughts ran swiftly through Herbert’s mind. Then they took another turn. There was some of his father’s nature in him, and he began to wish she was not Mr. Grey’s daughter. True, neither he nor anyone knew anything against Mr. Grey, but his father disliked him and suspected him, and looked down upon him. He had once been their tenant in White’s Row, where Nancy Sharp lived, and he had heard that Mrs. Grey had done plain sewing for his mother, and that Louie had helped her. All this was pretty bad, and Herbert felt himself grow hot as he thought of taking for his wife a girl who had lived in White’s Row and whose mother had sewed for his mother.
“But I love her. I couldn’t give her to anyone else, and Fred Lansing is quite too attentive to her. Such cold-blooded chaps as he go off quick when they go at all,” he kept saying to himself, and jealousy of Fred Lansing had a good deal to do with his final decision.
The village clock was striking one when they at last reached the Grey house. The moon was now a little past the zenith, and pouring a flood of light over everything. The piazza under the vines, with its rugs and chairs and table, where Louie kept her books and work when sitting there, looked very inviting, but Louie made no movement toward it. She was going into the house, when Herbert said to her:
“Hold on a minute. Let’s sit here a while and talk. There’s a lot I want to say to you, and the night is too fine to go indoors.”
He led her to a chair at the end of the piazza, where she sat down, and, leaning back in a reclining position, said:
“I shall not stay here long, for I am half asleep and dead tired, so say what you have to say, quickly, and excuse me if I shut my eyes, my lids are so heavy. Don’t be too long and prosy. What is it? Nothing about that bank affair, I hope. I am sick and tired hearing of it.”
Herbert would rather have looked into Louie’s eyes, which always inspired him, but he made no protest against her closing them, and thought how lovely she was with her long, dark lashes, resting on her cheeks and the light which came in patches through the vines making her face like a piece of marble. He wanted to kiss her, but the time had not come yet. She was queer about some things, and would resent it unless he had a right, which he meant to have before he left her.
It was a little difficult to begin, and he was not quite sure whether he wanted to commit himself or not, but after sitting a few moments in silence, watching her and gloating over her beauty, which was sure to be his own if he chose, he put his hand on hers, which lay on the arm of the chair. She did not move or try to take it away, and, emboldened by this, he bent down and whispered:
“Louie, I love you.”