UNREQUITED LOVE.
"Good gracious, Miss Walsingham! Is it possible that this can be you?"
He seized her hand with a pressure which told of his delight; his tones were thrilling with glad excitement; his face was beaming with joy at this queer meeting.
He drew her up from her rough seat, and, still retaining her hand, made her walk with him, as if he was determined not to lose her again, and he feasted his eyes upon her face, utterly heedless of the group of gayly-dressed people he had left, and rattled on with a storm of inquiries.
"Where did you disappear to? No one could give me any satisfaction about you, and I sought you in every direction. Come away from this confounded dock. What are you doing here alone? Will you walk with me, and let me have a conversation with you? Don't deny me this time, Miss Walsingham. We're not at Hautville Park."
They walked through the crooked lanes of the town, and took a road which led anon to mown fields, and to furze commons, and to holts of scrawny hazel, where the red clouds of evening could gaze upon their deeper reflections, unbroken by toiling barge, or floating timber, or stationary ships; and where pleasant willows made flickering shadows, and dipped into the rippling current.
"Now," said the young duke, when nothing but the bleating of lambs or the lowing of oxen was likely to interrupt them, "tell me why you left Hautville Park, and what you are doing here?"
"Why do you put me through such an inquisition?" asked Margaret. "When I left Hautville Park I wished to be dropped by Lady Juliana's friends. Your grace will confer an obligation by remembering this."
"I do not aspire to the honor of being Lady Juliana Ducie's friend, therefore beg to be considered exempt from your prohibition."
"On your own behalf, then, your grace, I am compelled to forbid any further interest in my movements. My sphere in life utterly removes me from your attention, and my path will probably never cross yours after to-day."