‘How can you say so? Do you mean that you have ever doubted for a moment—that you have not known—every day we have been together since that day at the brook-side? Bah! you want to make a fool of me. You tempt me to put things into words that ought not to be spoken.’
‘But, Mr. Bertie,’ said Kate, after a pause to make sure that he had stopped—and her voice was child-like in its simplicity—‘I like things to be put into words—I don’t like people to break off in the middle. You were saying since that day by the brook-side?’
He turned to her with a short, agitated laugh. ‘Perhaps you don’t remember about it,’ he said. ‘I do—everything that happened—every word that was said—every one of the tears. You don’t cry now as you used to do, or open your heart.’
‘I don’t cry when people can see me,’ said Kate. ‘I have cried enough, if you had been in the way to perceive it, this last year.’
‘My poor, sweet——’ Here he stopped; his voice had melted and changed. But all of a sudden he stopped short, with quite a different kind of alteration. ‘Should you be afraid to go the rest of the way alone?’ he said, abruptly. ‘I will stand here till I see you on the steps, and you can call to me if you are afraid.’
‘I am not in the least afraid,’ said Kate, proudly. ‘I was quite able to walk up the avenue by myself, if that was all.’ And then she laughed. ‘Mr. Bertie,’ she said, demurely, ‘it is you who are afraid, not I.’
‘I suppose you are right,’ he said. ‘Well, then, as you are strong, be merciful—don’t tempt me. If you like to know that there is some one to be dragged at your chariot wheels, it would be easy to give you that satisfaction. Perhaps, indeed, as we have begun upon this subject, it is better to have it out.’
‘Much better, I think,’ said Kate, with a glibness and ease which surprised herself. Was it because she was heartless? The fact was rather that she was happy, which is a demoralising circumstance in some cases.
‘Well,’ he said, with a hard breath, ‘since you prefer to have it in plain words, Miss Courtenay, you may as well know, once for all, that since that day at the brook-side I have thought of no one but you. I don’t suppose it is likely I shall ever think of anyone else all my life in that way. It can be no pleasure to me to speak, or to you to hear, of any such hopeless and insane notion. It is more your fault than mine, after all; for if you had not cried, I should not have leaped over the hedge, and trespassed, and——’
‘What would you do?’ said Kate, softly, ‘if you saw the same sight again now?’