"Oh, I have got things to do!" cried Hester, in alarm. "My mother will be here immediately, but I—have got something up stairs——"
"Always when I come," he said. "Just once, because I am here, listen to me, Hester. It won't take very long. I think you use me very ill. You know I come here for you, and you will never let me see you. And now when I find you by chance, you insist that you have something to do. Leave it till to-morrow. Perhaps after to-morrow," said Harry, in a lugubrious voice, "I may not be coming any more."
"Is anything to happen to-morrow?" said Hester, betrayed by his seeming gravity.
Then Harry cheered up again, and became more at his ease.
"Not," he said, "if something should happen to-night. That's what I wish—that something should happen now. Sit down, please, and listen. Don't you know, Hester—they say women always know—that I've been in love with you ever so long?"
"No, I don't know anything about it," said Hester, though a sudden flush came over her face.
She had seated herself on the sofa in a kind of desperation, fearing that he meant to place himself beside her. And such had been Harry's intention; but some dim sense of fitness moved him to depart from this portion of his programme. He stood before her instead, looking down upon her, feeling now that he had it all in his own hands.
"It is true, though. What do you suppose I have been coming here for every night? I think I've been in love with you ever since I first saw you—when you were only a child. Now I'm alone since my sister is married, and quite free to choose where I like. He made a pause, but Hester did not say anything. She sat drawing patterns upon the carpet with her foot, listening—because she could not help it. She who was so full of eagerness and life, it seemed to Harry as if every line of her figure expressed the listlessness of a subject that wearied her. Now this was more than a fellow could stand, although even now he felt that it drew him on. "By Jove!" he cried, "one would think you were getting offers every day of your life."
She looked up at him with a brightening countenance.