“A strange place,” he said, “for Sir Robert Ramsay’s heir.”
“Oh, what am I caring for Sir Robert Ramsay! If he was ill and wanted me, I would be at his call night and day—he is my uncle, whatever happens; but because he is rich and can leave me a fortune! that is nothing, Ronald, to you and me.”
He made no immediate reply, but smoothed the little curls of her hair upon her forehead, which was at once an easier and a much more pleasant thing to do.
“Besides,” she said, “I have known plenty of kent folk, as good as you or me, who lived, and just liked it very well, up a common stair.”
“I would not like my Lily, coming out of George Square, to set up in life like that.”
“Would you like your Lily,” she cried again, turning upon him with glowing cheeks, “to sit alone and pingle at her seam and eat her heart away, even at George Square, where she might see you whiles, or, worse still, here at Dalrugas,” she said, springing from her seat with energy, “to be smoored in the snow?”
He followed her round to the window, and stood holding her in his arm and looking at her admiringly. “You will never be smoored in the snow, my Lily! The fire in you is enough to melt it into rivers all about.”
“Rivers that will carry me—where?” she cried in a tone half of laughter, half of despair.
“Listen to me, my darling,” he said. “We will be practical: there is always the poetry to fall back upon. For one thing, I’ve no house, even if it were up a common stair or in the highest house of the old town, to take you to. Houses, as you know as well as me, can only be got at the term. There is no chance now till Whit-Sunday of finding one. We must just be patient, Lily; we can do no more. It is not you, my darling, that will suffer the most. Think of me in all the old places that will mind me of you at every moment, and seeing all the folk that know you, and even hearing your name——”
“Oh,” cried Lily, and then suddenly she fell a-crying, leaning on her husband, “I would like to hear your name now and then just to give me heart, and to see the folk that know you, and the old places——”