'But,' said Desvœux, 'how do you know that the nun did not turn out to be some one, if only I had chosen to fill up those et cæteras?'
'Well,' said Sutton, who apparently had had enough of the joke 'that part of the story I will tell you myself. The nun was a male one—my good friend Boldero, who took me into his quarters, looked after me for six weeks, till I got about again, and was as good a nurse as any one could wish for.'
'I should have liked to be the nun,' Maud cried, moved by a sudden impulse which brought the words out as the thought flashed into her mind, and turning crimson, as was her wont, before they were out of her mouth.
'That is very kind of you,' said Sutton, standing up, and defending her, as Maud felt, from all eyes but his own; 'and you would have been a very charming nurse and cured me, I dare say, even faster than Boldero. And now, Desvœux, go and sing us a song as a finale to your story.
Maud knew perfectly well that this was a mere diversion to save her from the confusion of a thoughtless speech and turn Desvœux's attention from her. It seemed quite natural and of a piece with Sutton's watchful, sympathetic care to give her all possible pleasure and to shield her from every shade of annoyance. A thrill of gratitude shot through her. There was a charm, a fascination, in protection so prompt, so delicate, so kind, compared with which all other attractions seemed faint indeed. That evening Maud went to bed with her heart in a tumult, and wept, she knew not wherefore, far into the night—only again and again the tears streamed out—the outcome, though as yet she knew it not, of that purest of all pure fountains, an innocent first love.
CHAPTER XIV.
TO THE HILLS!
However marred, and more than twice her years,
Scarred with an ancient sword-cut on the cheek,
And bruised and bronzed,—she lifted up her eyes,
And loved him with that love which was her doom.