"You will never become a Highland-woman," he said, with a grave kindness. "Is it needful? I would rather see you as you are than playing a part."
Her eyes expressed some quick wonder, for he had almost quoted her father's words to her.
"You would rather see me as I am?" she said, demurely. "But what am I? I don't know myself."
"You are a beautiful and gentle-hearted Englishwoman," he said, with honest admiration—"a daughter of the South. Why should you wish to be anything else? When you come to us, I will show you a true Highland-woman—that is, my cousin Janet."
"Now you have spoiled all my ambition," she said, somewhat petulantly. "I had intended spending all the winter in training myself to forget the habits and feelings of an actress, and I was going to educate myself for another kind of life; and now I find that when I go to the Highlands you will compare me with your cousin Janet!"
"That is impossible," said he, absently, for he was thinking of the time when the summer seas would be blue again, and the winds soft, and the sky clear; and then he saw the white boat of the Umpire going merrily out to the great steamer to bring the beautiful stranger from the South to Castle Dare!
"Ah, well, I am not going to quarrel with you on this our last day together," she said, and she gently placed her soft white hand on the clinched fist that rested on the table. "I see you are in great trouble—I wish I could lessen it. And yet how could I wish that you could think of me less, even during the long winter evenings, when it will be so much more lonely for you than for me? But you must leave me my hobby all the same; and you must think of me always as preparing myself and looking forward; for at least you know you will expect me to be able to sing a Highland ballad to your friends."
"Yes, yes," he said, hastily, "if it is all true—if it is all possible—what you speak of. Sometimes I think it is madness of me to fling away my only chance; to have everything I care for in the world near me, and to go away and perhaps never return. Sometimes I know in my heart that I shall never see you again—never after this day."
"Ah, now," said she, brightly—for she feared this black demon getting possession of him again—"I will kill that superstition right off. You shall see me after to-day; for as sure as my name is Gertrude White, I will go up to the railway station to-morrow morning and see you off. There!"
"You will?" he said, with a flush of joy on his face.