The black eyes and the blue ones met for an instant, Cecil’s full of passion, Molly’s full of incredulous amazement, but her lover did not wait for her to utter a protest, he caught her little hands in both his own—and said eagerly:
“Louise, darling, I owe you an apology for the unjust words I said to you that day at Ferndale. They were not true, for I love you as I hinted to you then, and it was pique at your rejoinder that made me blurt out those untruthful words. Will you forgive me, and let me love you?”
He had never spoken such words to any woman before, but carried away by the strength of his newly discovered passion, they rushed from his lips eloquent with the heart’s emotion. He had a right to expect a serious reply, but to his horror, mortification, and distress, Molly blurted out a curt:
“Nonsense!”
Her elegant lover gave a gasp as if some one had thrown cold water over him, and a momentary anger struggled with the delicious emotion of love. He lifted his violet eyes to her face full of reproachful tenderness.
“Louise!” he exclaimed.
She hung her pretty head in bashful confusion.
“You did not mean it!” she muttered, deprecatingly.
“I did mean it. I do mean it. Do not coquette with me, Louise, when I am so much in earnest. You said just now you never had a lover. You have one now—will you reject him, or will you accept the heart he offers? Will you be my wife, little one?”
He felt her trembling as he held her hands tightly in his, and dropping one, he placed his hand beneath her chin and lifted her face so that he might look into her eyes. To his surprise and joy they drooped bashfully, and the warm color rose over her face.