She nestled slightly toward him, and he thrilled with happiness at the confiding motion.
"You will send me home to papa?" she repeated, sweetly.
Then he said:
"It will be several hours before the next train for Boston leaves, Kathleen, so you can tell me all about yourself while we ride about and beguile the time of waiting. Or, would you prefer to go to a hotel and rest, and have some refreshments?"
"I am not hungry nor tired, and prefer to ride about with you this way," answered the girl, with naïve simplicity; and he drew a sigh of relief.
He was young, but more worldly wise than Kathleen. He preferred not to take her to a hotel until she had some claim on him, to silence carping tongues. But first he must know the secret of her mysterious whereabouts ever since the night when he had kissed and wept over her beautiful dead face, and gone away on a mission that brooked no delay.
But for a few minutes he was silent from sheer happiness. Alive, his beautiful Kathleen, whom he had adored in secret, but never told of his love! What happiness, when he and happiness had so long been strangers!
Her tremulous voice broke the silence:
"Do you understand it all—that I was in a trance that night when you bade me farewell and went away?"
"My God! a trance? Yes, you did look natural. Mrs. Churchman remarked upon it before she left me alone with you."