Beside the fire, in an easy chair, sat my grey-haired old relation and host, and, not far off, his wife. Hospitable, warm-hearted, and genial both of them were. If marriages really are made in heaven, I could not help thinking theirs must have been, so much did they seem each other's counterpart.
Presently Cousin Maggie entered, smiling to me as she did so; her left hand lingered fondly for a moment on her father's grey locks, then she sat down unbidden to the piano. My own face was partially shaded by the window curtain, so that I could study that of my fair cousin as she played without appearing rude. Was she beautiful? that was the question I asked myself, and was trying hard to answer. Every feature of her face was faultless, her mouth and ears were small, she had a wealth of rich, deep auburn hair, and eyes that seemed to have borrowed the noonday tints of a summer sea, so bright, so blue were they. But was she beautiful? I could not answer the question then.
On the strength of my blood relationship, distant though it was, for we were really only third or fourth cousins, I was made a member of this family from the first, and Maggie treated me as a brother. I was not entirely pleased with the latter arrangement, because many days had not passed ere I concluded it would be a pleasant pastime for me to make love to Cousin Maggie. But weeks went by, and my love-making was still postponed; it became a sine die kind of a probability. Maggie was constantly with me when out of doors—my companion in all my fishing and shooting trips. But she carried not only a rod but even a rifle herself, she could give me lessons in casting the fly—and did; she often shot dead the seals that I had merely wounded, and her prowess in rowing astonished me, and her daring in venturing so far to sea in our broad, open boat often made me tremble for our safety.
A frequent visitor for the first two months of my stay at R—— was a young and well-to-do farmer and fisher, who came in his boat from a neighbouring island, always accompanied by his sister, and they usually stayed a day or two. I was not long in perceiving that this Mr. Thorforth was very fond of my cousin; the state of her feelings towards him it was some time before I could fathom, but the revelation came at last, and quite unexpectedly.
There was an old ruin some distance from the house, where, one lovely moonlight night, I happened to be seated alone. I was not long alone, however; from a window I could see my cousin and Thorforth coming towards the place, and, thinking to surprise them, I drew back under the shadow of a portion of the wall. But I was not to be an actor in that scene, though it was one I shall never forget. I could not see his face, but hers, on which the moonbeams fell, was pained, half-frightened, impatient. He was telling her he loved her and asking her to love him in return. She stopped him at last.
What she said need not be told. In a few moments he was gone, and she was standing where he left her, following him with pitying eyes as he walked hurriedly away.
Next day Magnus Thorforth said goodbye and left: even his sister looked sad. She must have known it all. I never saw them again.
One day, about a month after this, Maggie and I were together in a cave close by the ocean—a favourite haunt of ours on hot forenoons. Our boat was drawn up close by, the day was bright, and the sea calm, its tiny wavelets making drowsy, dreamy music on the yellow sands.
She had been reading aloud, and I was gazing at her face.
"I begin to think you are beautiful," I said.