"Why," said Holyday, thrown back into his agitation, "there's no time for wooing before this marriage. It must wait till after."
"Troth, how do I know 'twill be to my liking, then, without ever a sample of it first?"
"Did I not say within," he faltered, feeling very red and foolish, "that your charms overpower my tongue?"
"Well, if you think a maid is to be won for the mere asking, even though to save herself at a pinch, I marvel at you."
Her tone was decidedly chill. He felt she was slipping from him, and he thought of the relentless man behind the cross; he must rouse himself to a decisive effort.
"Stay," he said, as the perspiration came out upon his face. "If you must have wooing—god 'a' mercy!—Thy charms envelop me as some sweet cloud Of heavenly odours, making me to swoon."
She threw him a side-glance of amazement, from her pretended search of the ground.
"Wooing!" he thought; "she shall have it, of the strongest." And he went on: "And wert thou drowned in the floorless sea, Thine eyes would draw me to the farthest depths."
"Why," quoth she, "that sounds like what the players speak. Do you woo in blank verse?"
"'Tis mine own, I swear," he said, truly enough, for it was from his new puppet-play of Paris and Helen. "I'll give you as many lines as you desire,—only remember that time presses. I must away before eleven o'clock. Best agree to be waiting at the gate at nightfall, ready for flight."