“What means this?” he said, sternly.
“Just that Quintin and I love one another!”
And as she spoke I saw the frown gather ominously on Alexander Gordon’s face. His wife came near and looked at him. I saw him flash a glance at her so quick, so stern, and full of meaning that the ready river of her speech froze on her lips.
“This is rank foolishness, Mary!” he cried; “go indoors this instant and get to your broidering. Let me hear no more of this!”
But the spirit of the Gordons was in the daughter as well as in the sire.
“I will not,” she said; “I am of age, and though in all else I have obeyed you, in this I will not.”
Glance for glance their eyes encountered, nor could I see that either pair quailed.
The Laird of Earlstoun turned to me.
“And you, sir, whom I trusted as my friend, how came you here under pretext of amity, thus to lead away my daughter?”
The question was fiercely spoken, the tone sullenly angry. Yet somehow both rang hollow.