Her wonderful beauty, so out of place in that wild region, thrilled him strangely. Her queenly manner, her delicacy and refinement astonished him, and he wondered more and more what mysterious circumstances could have combined to drive two such cultivated people so far from civilization to hide themselves in the rugged fastnesses of those dreary mountains.
Chapter IV.
A Mountain Ramble.
"You were reading," he remarked, stooping to pick up the book that had fallen to the ground as she arose. "Tacitus!" he added, in a tone of astonishment, as his eye fell upon the title page.
"Yes, I am reviewing; papa likes me to study a little every day, still," Virgie returned, quietly, while she examined her flowers with a critical eye, and wondered that a gentleman could have arranged them so well.
He must be an artist, she thought, for no one save an artist, or a lover of art, could have taken such pains to harmonize colors like that.
"I should suppose you would labor under serious difficulties in trying to pursue your studies in such a place as this," Mr. Heath remarked.
"Oh, no, papa is a fine scholar, and he makes a most delightful teacher."
"And have you pursued a regular course under him?"
"Yes, partly. I left school when I was fifteen, but I have kept right on the same as I should have done if I had remained, and I graduated two years ago," she concluded, smiling archly at the idea of graduating in that wild country.
"And with high honors, of course," said her companion in the same vein.