Then she put her arms about his neck, [pg 160] and lifting up her innocent face to his, gave him her heart in one long kiss.
(Just then a light foot, passing toward the house from a neighbor's, paused at the arbor door, all unknown to those within, and little Martha Hopkins, the neighbor's daughter and Hannah's special pet, looked in upon them for a moment. Then she sped quickly to Deacon Fletcher's house, and burst, all excitement, into the kitchen.)
'Will you wait for me, Hannah, darling,' said Jason, 'all the time it may take me to get ready for a wife, and never love any other man, nor let any other man love you? Never forget me, for years and years, perhaps, till I come back for you? Will you always remember that we love each other, and that you are to be my wife?'
'I will wait for you, dear, if I wait till I die,' she answered.
He folded her yet more closely to his breast.
While they held each other thus, forgetting all else in the world, his father burst, furious and terrible, into the arbor!
He seized them with a strong and cruel rasp, and tore them pitilessly asunder.
'Go into the house, boy,' he cried, 'and leave this'—
'Stop!' shouted Jason, springing to his feet, his face as white as death and his eyes flashing—'Stop! Do not call her any name but a good name! I would not bear it if you were twenty times my father!'
The old man stood transfixed.