uld not refuse me, yet she was so modest, so
retiring, that though I had most perseveringly sought her favor since
the first moment I had seen her, I could not tell whether she cared for
me or not.

To judge by Coralie's standard, she did not like me. In all our
conversation it half maddened me to see the lovely eyes I loved so
dearly dropped shyly away from me.

It may not be a very elegant comparison, but she always reminded me of
some shy, beautiful bird. She had a bright, half-startled way of looking
at me. Several times, when I met her suddenly, I saw the lovely face
flush and the little hands tremble.

Did she love me or did she not? I could not tell. Of whom should I take
counsel? There was a bird singing over me; I wondered if that sweet
night-song was all of love. Alas! that I had not been more into the
world of women--their ways and fashions were all mysteries to me.

"Faint heart never won fair lady," says the old proverb, and it ran
through my mind. I resolved to try my fortune. If she did not love me,
why then, life held nothing more for me. If I could not win her I would
never ask the love of woman more, but live out my life with Clare.

Like many other anxious lovers, I lay awake all night, wondering what I
should say to her, how I should woo her, in what words I should ask her
to be my wife. When day dawned I was still undecided, only that it was
to be.

"You are going away early," said Coralie, as I ordered my horse. "Surely
you will not be away all day, Sir Edgar?"

"I am going to Harden Manor, and cannot say when I shall return. Do not
wait dinner for me--I may dine there."

"It will be a long, dark day," she said, with a sigh. "Do not be
late--every hour will seem like two."

She hovered round me, asking many questions, evidently seeking to know
my business there. When my horse was brought to the door, she came to me
with a delicate spray of heliotrope.

"Let me fasten this in your coat, Sir Edgar. No gentleman looks
completely dressed without a flower. You do not know what heliotrope
means. Men never--or, at least, very seldom--care for the sweetest of
all languages--the language of flowers. What that heliotrope means,
cousin, I say to you."

It was not until some weeks afterward that, looking quite accidentally
over an old book, I discovered the spray of heliotrope meant, "I love
you."

The beautiful picture of this fair, passionate woman died from my mind
as I went to seek one a th