Happy Mr. Gilbert! And yet, if he had stopped to analyze that frank, glad, sisterly welcome, he would have known it the most ominous thing on earth for his hopes. Had he been Laurence Thorndyke she would never have welcomed him like this. But just now he took the goods the gods provided, and never stopped to analyze.
"Perhaps I was mistaken after all about Thorndyke," he thought, "he has gone for good, and I never saw her look more brightly blooming. After all a girl's fancy for a handsome face, and a flirting manner, need not be very deep or lasting. It was only a fancy, and died a natural death in a week. How fortunate I spoke in time, and how clear and true she rings! I will ask her to be my wife before I leave Kent Farm."
He had come to stake his fate—"to win or lose it all," to lay his life at her feet, but he had hoped for nothing like this. He loved her—he knew it now as your staid middle-aged men do once in a lifetime. He had waited until he could wait no longer—she might refuse, he had little hope of anything else, but then at least, any certainty was better than suspense.
Mr. Gilbert's greeting from the Kent family was all that mortal man could look for. They had guessed his secret; perhaps they also guessed his object in coming now. He was very rich, and above them no doubt, but was there king or kaiser in all the world too good for their beautiful Norine.
He stayed to tea. After that meal, while Aunt Hetty was busy in the kitchen, and the men about the farm-yard, he found himself alone in the front room with Miss Bourdon. She stood looking out through the undrawn curtains at the still, white, melancholy winter night.
The first surprise and delight of the meeting past, she had grown very still. His coming had brought other memories rushing upon her as she stood here in that pretty attitude looking out at the frosty stars.
She was nerving herself to ask a question. Without turning round, and speaking very carelessly, she asked it.
"I suppose Mr. Thorndyke is in New York. Have you seen him lately?"
A jealous pang shot through the lawyer's heart. She remembered yet.
"I see him very often," he answered, promptly, and a little coldly; "I saw him the day I left. He is about to be married."