of him pretty frequently during his absence. And Captain Sedgewick's talk
about Gilbert Fenton generally closed with a regretful sigh, the meaning
of which had grown very clear to Marian.

She thought about her uncle's words and looks and sighs a good deal in
the quiet of her own room. What was there she would not do for the love
of that dearest and noblest of men? Marry a man she disliked? No, that
was a sin from which the girl's pure mind would have recoiled
instinctively. But she did like Gilbert Fenton--loved him perhaps--though
she had never confessed as much to herself.

This calm friendship might really be love after all; not quite such love
as she had read of in novels and poems, where the passion was always
rendered desperate by the opposing influence of adverse circumstances and
unkind kindred; but a tranquil sentiment, a dull, slow, smouldering
fire, that needed only some sudden wind of jealousy or misfortune to fan
it into a flame.

She knew that his society was pleasant to her, that she would miss him
very much when he left Lidford; and when she tried to fancy him
reconciled to her rejection of him, and returning to London to transfer
his affections to some other woman, the thought was very obnoxious to
her. He had not flattered her, he had been in no way slavish in his
attentions to her; but he had surrounded her with a kind of atmosphere of
love and admiration, the charm of which no girl thus beloved for the
first time in her life could be quite proof against.

Thus the story ended, as romances so begun generally do end. There came a
summer twilight, when Gilbert Fenton found himself once more upon the
dewy lawn under the walnut-trees alone with Marian Nowell. He repeated
his appeal in warmer, fonder tones than before, and with a kind of
implied certainty that the answer must be a favourable one. It was
something like taking the fortress by storm. He had his arm round her
slim waist, his lips upon her brow, before she had time to consider what
her answer ought to be.

"My darling, I cannot live without you!" he said, in a low passionate
voice. "Tell me that you love me."

She disengaged herself gently from his embrace, and stood a little way
from him, with shy, downcast eyelids.

"I think I do," she said slowly.

"That is quite enough, Marian!" cried Gilbert, joyously. "I knew you were
destined to be my wife."

He drew her hand through his arm and took her back to the house, where
the Captain