The queen of the isle

by May Agnes Fleming

All unconscious of the struggle raging in his breast, Christie stood leaning against a tree, her curved crimson lips half parted—her blue eyes fixed on a cloud drifting slowly over the sky, little dreaming of the far darker clouds gathering rapidly, now, over the horizon of her life.

And still in Willard's heart went on the struggle. He dared not look at her as she stood before him—-bright, radiant, bewildering—lest the last lingering remains of fidelity and honor should be swept away by the fierce impetuosity of passion in his unstable heart.

But his good angel was in the ascendant still, for at that moment the voice of Carl was heard calling loudly;

"Christie! Christie!"

"Here, Carl! Here I am," she answered; and in another instant honest Carl stood before them.

"Aunt Tom sent me looking for you," said the young gentleman, rather sulkily; "and I've been tramping through the woods this half-hour, while you were taking it easy here," said Carl, wiping the perspiration from his brow.

"It was all my fault, my good Carl," said Willard, as Christie hastily snatched up her hat and basket and fled, having a just terror of Mrs. Tom's sharp tongue. "Make my excuses to your good aunt, and here is something for yourself."

Carl's dull face brightened wonderfully as Willard drew a gold piece from his pocket and pressed it into his hand, and then turned his steps slowly in the direction of Campbell Castle, thinking all earthly happiness lay centered in the opposite direction.

Mrs. Tom's reproaches fell unheeded, for the first time, on Christie's ear that day. She heard not a word of the long lecture delivered with more than the good widow's usual eloquence, for she was thinking of another voice, whose lowest tone had power already to thrill to the innermost recesses of her heart. She loved without knowing it, without wishing to define the new, delicious feeling filling her breast, only conscious she had never been so happy before in her life, and longing for the time when she should see him again. Ah, well had it been for her had they never met more.