'She be going after her young man down to the lane end,' cried the girl.
Orange's cheek burned. That was true—hatefully true. She was going to seek her lover, but only because he did not come to see her. After this incident she was unmolested. She met no one else on her long walk to Trecarrel.
Would she find the Captain up? She hoped so, she supposed so, for she knew that he sat up late; he had often told her as much. It was as she had conjectured and hoped. When she reached the house, she saw a light from his smoking-room, a comfortable room, where he kept his whips and guns; a room ornamented with stuffed foxes' heads and their tails, and with the antlers of red deer. A door from this little room opened on to the lawn. Orange went to the window, but the blind was down and she could not see in; but she heard Trecarrel within whistling an air; it was an operatic air he had recently heard in Exeter, and which had caught his fancy. How splendidly La Fontana had sung! What schooling her voice had gone through, and what quality was in it! How graceful she was, and what passionate action she showed. 'You never get that sort of a thing out of an Englishwoman,' he mused. 'Our countrywomen cannot act; they have no fire, no passion, they are dolls, and move mechanically. Their voices, moreover—— Good heavens! Who is that?'
He started up. The door opened, and Orange came in. He had been seated over his fire, with his cravat off, a bottle of claret and a glass on the table at his side; he had just finished a pipe.
'No fire, no passion in an English girl!'
There were both before him, flaming in Orange's eye, and heaving in her bosom.
'Bless my soul, Orange, what on earth has brought you here?'
'You, Harry, you!' She was out of breath, and choking with emotion. 'Oh, Harry, dear Harry, why have you not been to see me?'
'Come over to the fire. You must be cold.'
'I—I, cold!' she laughed bitterly. 'I am burning; feel my hand. I have run; but it is not that. The flame is here.' She touched her heart. 'It is eating its way, it is consuming me. Oh, Harry, why have you not been to see me? You do not know what I have suffered.'