"And so you have thought of me, Norine!"
"Oh, so often! And hoped, and longed, and looked for your coming. But you never came, and you never wrote, and I was sure you had forgotten me altogether."
Here was an opening, and – he let it fall dead! He might be a clever lawyer, but certainly he was not a clever lover. He was smiling, and yes, actually blushing, and tingling with delight to his finger ends. Her radiant, blooming face was upturned to him, the black eyes lifted and dancing, and he looked down upon those sparkling charms, and in a flat voice – said this:
"We have had a great deal of snow lately. How are your uncles and aunts?"
But the young lady's enthusiasm was not in the least dampened. He was her friend, not her lover, he was a kindly gleam of sunshine across the dead level of her sad-colored life.
"They are all very well, thank you, Mr. Gilbert, and will be very glad to see you. Sit down and take off your overcoat. You'll stay for tea, won't you, and all night? Oh, how pleasant it is to see you back here again!"
Happy Mr. Gilbert! And yet, if he had stopped to analyze that frank, glad, sisterly welcome, he would have known it the most ominous thing on earth for his hopes. Had he been Laurence Thorndyke she would never have welcomed him like this. But just now he took the goods the gods provided, and never stopped to analyze.
"Perhaps I was mistaken after all about Thorndyke," he thought, "he has gone for good, and I never saw her look more brightly blooming. After all a girl's fancy for a handsome face, and a flirting manner, need not be very deep or lasting. It was only a fancy, and died a natural death in a week. How fortunate I spoke in time, and how clear and true she rings! I will ask her to be my wife before I leave Kent Farm."
He had come to stake his fate – "to win or lose it all," to lay his life at her feet, but he had hoped for nothing like this. He loved her – he knew it now as your staid middle-aged men do once in a lifetime. He had waited until he could wait no longer – she might refuse, he had little hope of anything else, but then at least, any certainty was better than suspense.
Mr. Gilbert's greeting from the Kent family was all that mortal man could look for. They had guessed his secret; perhaps they also guessed his object in coming now. He was very rich, and above them no doubt, but was there king or kaiser in all the world too good for their beautiful Norine.
He stayed to tea. After that meal, while Aunt Hetty was busy in the kitchen, and the men about the farm-yard, he found himself alone in the front room with Miss Bourdon. She stood looking out through the undrawn curtains at the still, white, melancholy winter night.
The first surprise and delight of the meeting past, she had grown very still. His coming had brought other memories rushing upon her as she stood here in that pretty attitude looking out at the frosty stars.
She was nerving herself to ask a question. Without turning round, and speaking very carelessly, she asked it.
"I suppose Mr. Thorndyke is in New York. Have you seen him lately?"
A jealous pang shot through the lawyer's heart. She remembered yet.
"I see him very often," he answered, promptly, and a little coldly; "I saw him the day I left. He is about to be married."
She was standing with her back to him, fluttering in a restless sort of way. As he said this she suddenly grew still.
"The match is a very old affair," Mr. Gilbert went on, resolutely; "he has been engaged nearly two years. His uncle, Mr. Darcy, wishes it very much. The young lady is an heiress, and extremely handsome. They are very much attached to one another, it is said and are to be married early in the spring."
She did not move – she did not speak. A blank uncomfortable silence followed, and once more poor Mr. Gilbert's heart contracted with a painful jealous spasm. If she would only turn round and let him see her face. Who was to understand these girls!
"What! all in the dark, Norry?" cried Uncle Reuben's cheery voice, as he came bustling in redolent of stable odors. "Come, light up, and give Mr. Gilbert a song."
She obeyed at once. The glare of the lamp fell full upon her, what change was it that he saw in her face? She was hardly paler than usual, she rarely had much color, but there was an expression about the soft-cut childish mouth, an unpleasant tightness about the lips that quite altered the whole expression of the face.
She opened the piano and sung – sung and played better than he had ever heard her before. She sang for hours, everything she knew – Mr. Thorndyke's favorites and all. She never rose until the striking of ten told her that bedtime had come.
The lawyer stayed all night; but in that pleasant guest-chamber that had lodged his rival last, he slept little. Was she in love with Thorndyke, or was she not? Impossible to judge these women – any girl in her teens can baffle the shrewdest lawyer of them all. He lay tossing about full of hope, of love, of jealousy, of doubt, his fever at its very climax.
"I'll endure this torture no longer," he resolved, sullenly. "I'll ask her to marry me to-morrow."
With Richard Gilbert to resolve was to act. Five seconds after they had met, shaken hands, and said good-morning, he proposed a sleigh ride. The day was mild and sunny, the sleighing splendid, and a sleigh ride to a New Yorker a rare and delightful luxury. Would she go? Yes, she would go, but Miss Bourdon said it spiritlessly enough. And so the sleigh was brought round, and at ten o'clock in the crisp, yellow sunshine, the pair started.
But it must have been a much duller spirit than that of Norine that could have remained dull in that dazzling sunshine, that swift rush through the still frozen air. A lovely rose-pink came into her pale cheeks, a bright light into her brown eyes, her laugh rang out, she was herself as he had first known her once more.
"How splendid winter is, after all!" she exclaimed; "look at those crystallized hemlocks – did you ever see anything so beautiful? I sometimes wonder how I can find it so dreary."
"You do find it dreary, then?"
"Oh, so dreary – so long – so humdrum – so dull!" She checked herself with one of her pretty French gestures. "It seems ungrateful to say so, but I can't help it. Life seems hardly worth the living sometimes here."
"Here! Would it be better elsewhere?"
"Yes – I think so. Change is always pleasant. One grows dull and stupid living in one dull stupid place forever. Change is what I want, novelty is delight."
"Let me offer it to you then, Norine. Come to New York with me."
"Mr. Gilbert! With you!"
"With me – as my wife, I love you, Norine."
It was said. The old formula, the commonplace words that are to tell all that is in a heart full to overflowing. He sat very pale, beyond that and a certain nervous twitching of his face there was nothing to tell that all the happiness of his life hung on her reply. For her – she just looked at him blankly, incredulous – with wide open eyes of wonder.
"Your wife! Marry you! Mr. Gilbert!"
"I love you, Norine. It seems strange you have not known it until I tell it. I am double your age, but I will do my best to make you happy. Ah, Norine, if you knew how long I have thought of this – how dearly I love you, you would surely not refuse. I am a rich man, and all I have is yours. The world you have longed to see, you shall see. Be my wife Norine, and come with me to New York."
The first shock of surprise was over. She sat very still, looking straight out before her at the dazzling expanse of sun and snow. His words awoke no answering thrill in her heart, and yet she was conscious of a sense of pleasure. Be his wife – well, why not? The prospect of a new life broke upon her – the bright, exciting, ever-new life of a great city. She thought of that, not of Richard Gilbert.
"Speak to me, Norine," he said, "for Heaven's sake don't sit silent like this – only to answer no. For good or evil, let me have my answer at once."
But still she sat mute. She had lost Laurence Thorndyke – lost – nay he had never been hers for one poor second. He belonged