ous? oh, yes! madly, insanely
jealous! for she was fair above all women and sweet and pure and
tempting to all men like some ripe and juicy fruit ready to fall into a
yearning hand.

But his jealousy took on a note of melancholy and of humility. He
worshiped her so and wished to feel her all his own. She listened
entranced, forgetting her terrors, her disappointments, the vague ennui
which had assailed her of late. She yielded herself to the delights of
his caresses, to the joy of this hour of solitude and rapture. The night
was close and stormy; from afar, muffled peals of thunder echoed through
the gigantic elms, whilst vivid flashes of lightning weirdly lit up at
times the mysterious figure of this romantic lover, with his face
forever in shadow, one eye forever hidden behind a black band, his voice
forever muffled.

But it was a tempestuous wooing, a renewal of that happy evening in the
spring--oh! so long ago it seemed now!--when first he had poured in her
ear the wild torrents of his love. The girl--so young, so inexperienced,
so romantic--was literally swept off her feet; she listened to his wild
words, yielded her lips to his kiss, and whilst she half feared the
impetuosity of his mood, she delighted in the very terrors it evoked.

A secret marriage? Why, of course! since he suffered so terribly through
not feeling her all his own. Soon!--at once!--at Dover before the
clergyman at All Souls, with whom he--her prince--had already spoken.

Yes! it would have to be at Dover, for the neighboring villages might
prove too dangerous. Sir Marmaduke might hear of it, mayhap. It would
rest with her to free herself for one day.

Then came that delicious period of scheming, of stage-managing
everything for the all-important day. He would arrange about a chaise,
and she should walk up to the Canterbury Road to meet it. He would await
her in the church at Dover, for 'twas best that they should not be seen
together until after the happy knot was tied, when he declared that he
would be ready to defy the universe.

It had been a long interview, despite the tempest that raged above and
around them. The great branches of the elms groaned and cracked under
fury of the wind, the thunder pealed overhead and then died away with
slow majesty out towards the sea. From afar could be heard the angry
billows dashing themselves against the cliffs.

They had to seek shelter under the colonnaded porch of the summerhouse,
and Sue had m