"Only one thing I need to make me happy as I go, sweet lady!" said he, his voice tender, passionate, caressing. "It is bitter to leave you. But I should go thrilling with happiness, to win fame that would make you proud, or to die willingly for my country,—if I might go wearing your favour, if I might go as—" but here he paused. Barbara's face was cold and discouraging.
There was a moment of strained silence. Barbara felt a harsh resentment at his persistence, and an added anger that it should be thrust upon her on this day when her heart was so bitter sore. "Yet," she was arguing with herself, "the poor boy does love me. And, unlike some others, he is going to fight on the right side, to shed his blood, perhaps, for the land of his birth. Why should I not be a little kind to him,—if he does not ask too much!" On a sudden generous and pitying, if misleading, impulse, she took a ribbon from her throat and gave it to him.
"There, boy," she said, gently, "take that, and don't ever say I was not good to you! May it be a charm to ward off the bullet and the steel!"
A glad light flashed into the lad's face. He went down on one knee and kissed the hem of her skirt, crying something inarticulately. Then he sprang up and seized her in his arms, and would have kissed her but that she wrenched herself free with some violence.
"How dare you!" she cried, stamping her foot.
Cary looked crestfallen and bewildered.
"But, Barbara," he protested, blundering in his confusion, "don't you love me? I thought—why—this dear ribbon—" and he held it out to her appealingly.
Barbara's anger faded on the instant. She saw that in desiring to be kind she had misled him. She held out her hand to him, and smiled, as she said:
"Oh, truly, I'm sorry if I seemed rude, Cary. Forgive me. But, you know, I had to be rather hasty, or you would have kissed me. And I couldn't let you kiss me, Cary, even though you are going to the war!"
"Why not, dear heart?" persisted he. "Am I not going as your chosen cavalier? Have you not given me your favour?"