The grasshopper amid the green herbage, the cicada on the tree-leaf, the mock-bird on the top of the tall cotton-wood, and the nightjar soaring still higher in the moonlit air, apparently actuated by a simultaneous instinct, ceased to give utterance to their peculiar cries: as though one and all, by their silence, designed to do honour to the sacred ceremony transpiring in their presence!
But that temporary cessation of sounds was due to a different cause. A footstep grating upon the gravelled walk of the garden—and yet touching it so lightly, that only an acute ear could have perceived the contact—was the real cause why the nocturnal voices had suddenly become stilled.
The lovers, absorbed in the sweet interchange of a mutual affection, heard it not. They saw not that dark shadow, in the shape of man or devil, flitting among the flowers; now standing by a statue; now cowering under cover of the shrubbery, until at length it became stationary behind the trunk of a tree, scarce ten paces from the spot where they were kissing each other!
Little did they suspect, in that moment of celestial happiness when all nature was hushed around them, that the silence was exposing their passionate speeches, and the treacherous moon, at the same time, betraying their excited actions.
That shadowy listener, crouching guilty-like behind the tree, was a witness to both. Within easy earshot, he could hear every word—even the sighs and soft low murmurings of their love; while under the silvery light of the moon, with scarce a sprig coming between, he could detect their slightest gestures.
It is scarce necessary to give the name of the dastardly eavesdropper. That of Cassius Calhoun will have suggested itself.
It was he.