What
occurred to Elfride at this moment was a case in point. She was
vividly imagining, for the twentieth time, the kiss of the
morning, and putting her lips together in the position another
such a one would demand, when she heard the identical operation
performed on the lawn, immediately beneath her window.
A kiss--not of the quiet and stealthy kind, but decisive, loud,
and smart.
Her face flushed and she looked out, but to no purpose. The dark
rim of the upland drew a keen sad line against the pale glow of
the sky, unbroken except where a young cedar on the lawn, that had
outgrown its fellow trees, shot its pointed head across the
horizon, piercing the firmamental lustre like a sting.
It was just possible that, had any persons been standing on the
grassy portions of the lawn, Elfride might have seen their dusky
forms. But the shrubs, which once had merely dotted the glade,
had now grown bushy and large, till they hid at least half the
enclosure containing them. The kissing pair might have been
behind some of these; at any rate, nobody was in sight.
Had no enigma ever been connected with her lover by his hints and
absences, Elfride would never have thought of admitting into her
mind a suspicion that he might be concerned in the foregoing
enactment. But the reservations he at present insisted on, while
they added to the mystery without which perhaps she would never
have seriously loved him at all, were calculated to nourish doubts
of all kinds, and with a slow flush of jealousy she asked herself,
might he not be the culprit?
Elfride glided downstairs on tiptoe, and out to the precise spot
on which she had parted from Stephen to enable him to speak
privately to her father.
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