She started up, and clasped her hands about his arm.
“No, no!” she exclaimed, “go not thither! There is blood upon the threshold! Return: a dreadful fatality awaits you here.”
“Come with me, then,” said he, “and I yield my purpose.”
“It cannot be,” said Elsie.
“Then I, too, tell you it cannot be,” returned Redclyffe. [Endnote: 2.]
The dialogue had reached this point, when there came a step along the wood-path; the branches rustled, and there was Lord Braithwaite, looking upon the pair with the ordinary slightly sarcastic glance with which he gazed upon the world.
“A fine morning, fair lady and fair sir,” said he. “We have few such, except in Italy.”