"Why, didn't I tell you this morning? I'm going to be married—that is, if you will have me, Laura!"
Happy Laura! Such a rosy tide swept over her fair face, and dyed it radiant red to the roots of her hair.
"Oh, Val! I thought it was Miss Rose."
Val stared.
"Miss Rose! What the dickens put that in your head? I never thought of Miss Rose—I meant you all the time. Is it all right, Laura?"
All right! He need hardly have asked that question, seeing the radiant face before him. Laura laughed and cried, and blushed, and forgot all about her headache, and for the next fifteen minutes was completely and perfectly happy. It was one of those little glimpses of Eden that we poor pilgrims of the desert sometimes catch fleetingly as we wander wearily through long dreary wastes of sand, of sluggish marshes, or briery roads. Transient gleams of perfect joy, when we forget the past, and ask nothing of the future—when we hold the overflowing cup of bliss to our lips and drink to our heart's content.
"Dinner on the table!" Somebody made this announcement in a stentorian voice, and Val insisted on Laura's taking his arm, and accompanying him to the dining-room. Papa and Mamma Blair and Master Bill were waiting there; and Mr. Blake, ever prompt and business-like, led the blushing and shrinking fair one to the parental side, and boldly demanded their blessing. To say that Mr. and Mrs. Blair were astonished, would be doing no sort of justice to the subject; to say they were delighted, would be doing still less; and Miss Laura was formally made over to Mr. Blake before grace was said. Dinner was only a matter of form that day with Miss Blair—her appetite was effectually gone; and even Val—matter-of-fact, unromantic, unsentimental Val—ate considerably less underdone roast-beef than usual, and looked a good deal more across the table at the rosy, smiling face of his vis-a-vis than at the contents of his plate. But dinner was over at last, and an extra bottle of crusty old port drank to the happy event; and then Papa Blair buttoned up his overcoat and set off to business again, and Master Bill started full gallop for the office, to retail the news to Mr. Clowrie; and Mamma Blair went about her domestic concerns, and the lovers were alone together. But Mr. Blake was not at all "up" in the rôle of Romeo, and stood beside Laura at the window, looking at the pale moon rising, and using his toothpick.
"What a lovely night!" Laura said; for all the world, so lately a howling wilderness, was moonlight and couleur de rose to her now, with plain Val Blake standing by her side. "How beautifully the moon is rising over the bay!"
"Yes," said Mr. Blake, eying it with the glance of a connoisseur in moonshine. "It's rather a neat thing in the way of moonrise. What whistle's that?"
"It's the American boat getting in. Suppose we go down, Val, and see who's coming?"