"Surely such perfection must satisfy you as well as him, or you must be difficult to please," returned Queenie a little sarcastically. A numb, undefinable sort of pain seemed taking possession of her. Would Hepshaw be quite so desirable a place of residence when Dora was mistress of Church-Stile House? this was the question she asked herself. And for the first time the thought of her fortune gave her a positive feeling of pleasure.
"Oh, as to that, I am very fond of Dora," replied Cathy carelessly; "she amuses me, and she is very good-natured; and then one must like one's future sister-in-law for the sake of dear old Garth. I only hope she will have the good sense not to try and manage him, for he will never stand it."
This conversation depressed Queenie somehow, and kept her wakeful and restless; it did not add to her tranquillity to hear Garth's footsteps under her window, crunching the gravel walk, for long after they had retired. It was contrary to his usual habit; it argued disturbance or preoccupation of mind.
Garth's soliloquy would have perplexed both her and Cathy if they had heard it.
"I wonder if I am in love with Dora after all?" he was asking himself, as he lighted himself a fresh cigar, and then stood leaning against the little gate, looking down the plane-tree walk. It was moonlight now, and the monuments glimmered in the white light; there were faint, eerie shadows under the dark trees; now and then a night-bird called, or a dog barked from the village, and then stillness gathered over everything again.
"I wonder if I am really in love, or if I am only arguing myself into it. Now I come to think of it, when I imagined my future wife I always thought of Dora; we have grown up together, and it seems natural somehow; and then I had always a boyish fancy for golden hair. What a pretty little head it is, as well as a wise one. I wish she were not quite so independent, and would lean on a fellow more. I suppose it is the fault of circumstances. Every one depends on her—her father and her sisters. She never had the chance of being helpless like other women. I always think of that and make allowance for her faults.
"Sometimes," soliloquized the young philosopher as his cigar went out, and he calmly relighted it, "sometimes I'm afraid that if we ever came together I might find her a little masterful and opinionated; that is the danger with capable women, they have their own notions and stick to them. I confess I should like my wife to follow my ideas, and not to be lady paramount in everything; not that even Dora would find it easy to manage me," continued Garth, with an amused curl of the lip.
"What a nice, sensible little companion she would be for a man," he resumed presently, after the firm even footsteps had crunched the gravel awhile. "That is the best of her, she never bores or wearies one; she is always fresh and good-humored, and ready to take interest in everything, even in the schools, and Miss Marriott, only Miss Marriott repulses her somehow. Her manner vexed me this afternoon; there was a stand-offishness and a reserve in it, as though Dora's interest offended her. She never appears at her best advantage when Dora is with us. Why am I always comparing those two? somehow I can't help it. Dora interests me most, of course; and yet men who are in love seldom study the pros and cons of character as I have been doing for the last half-hour. Certainly some of the symptoms are still lacking, or else I am too matter-of-fact a fellow to have them. And yet I don't know. What were those lines Cathy repeated the other night? How well the little puss recited them; with such feeling too.
'Thy soul doth wait for mine, as mine for thee;
We cannot live apart.'
Humph! I am not in love so much as all that, and I don't think Dora is either. I have a doubt whether the 'open sesame' has been said to either of us yet; if so, 'where waitest thou, lady I am to love?' Well, it is a rare old poem, and touches a fellow up in an extraordinary sort of way. I have got it by heart now, and it haunts me to a droll extent. There, my cigar is out, confound it, so I may as well get rid of all this moonshine and go in. How runs the last verse—