Was the fearful expression it now wore a shadow, a forerunner of what he might expect? He shook off, with an effort that was less painful than the sufferance of the thought, both fears and prognostics. He turned his back and walked rapidly and uneasily up and down the path between the tree and the old well.
He had left Dorcas blooming, lovely, and twenty-two. As blooming, as lovely, as lithe, and as sparkling, she was now. His own eyes had seen the vision.
But would she remember and love him still? For the first time it occurred to him that he must himself be somewhat changed,—changed certainly, since old Taft did not recognize him, after all the hogsheads of rum he had sold him! For the first time he felt a little thrill of fear, lest Dorcas should have been inconstant,—or lest, seeing him now, she might not love him as she once did. A faint blush passed over his face.
He raised his eyes, and Dorcas stood before him at the distance of a few feet: the bloom on her delicate cheek the same,—the dimpled chin, the serene forehead, the arch and laughing eyes!
Somehow, she seemed like a ghost, too; for, when he stepped towards her, she retreated, keeping the same distance between them.
"Dorcas!" said Swan, imploringly.
"What do you want of me?" answered a sweet voice, trembling and low.
"Are you really Dorcas? really, really my Dorcas?" said Swan, in an agony of uncertain emotion.
"To be sure I am Dorcas!" answered the girl, in a half-terrified, half-petulant tone.
In a moment she darted up the path out of sight, just as Dorcas had done on the last night he had seen her!