all; how he had
taken her by the hand, claiming the right of doing so as an ordinary
farewell greeting; and how he had held her, looking into her face,
till she had been forced to speak some word of rebuke to him! "I did
not think you would behave like that," she had said. But yet at that
very moment her heart was going from her. The warm friendliness of
his touch, the firm, clear brightness of his eye, and the eager tone
of his voice, were even then subduing her coy unwillingness to part
with her maiden love. She had declared to herself then that she was
angry with him; but, since that, she had declared to herself that
nothing could have been better, finer, sweeter than all that he had
said and done on that evening. It had been his right to hold her, if
he intended afterwards to claim her as his own. "I like you so very
much," he had said; "why should we not be friends?" She had gone away
from him then, fleeing along the path, bewildered, ignorant as to
her own feelings, conscious almost of a sin in having listened to
him; but still filled with a wondrous delight that any one so good,
so beautiful, so powerful as he, should have cared to ask for her
friendship in such pressing words. During all her walk home she had
been full of fear and wonder and mysterious delight. Then had come
the ball, which in itself had hardly been so pleasant to her, because
the eyes of many had watched her there. But she thought of the moment
when he had first come to her in Mrs. Tappitt's drawing-room, just as
she was resolving that he did not intend to notice her further. She
thought of those repeated dances which had been so dear to her, but
which, in their repetition, had frightened her so grievously. She
thought of the supper, during which he had insisted on sitting by
her; and of that meeting in the hall, during which he had, as it
were, forced her to remain and listen to him,--forced her to stay
with him till, in her agony of fear, she had escaped away to her
friend and begged that she might be taken home! As she sat by Mrs.
Cornbury in the carriage, and afterwards as she had thought of it all
while lying in her bed, she had declared to herself that he had been
very wrong;--but since that, during those few days of her permitted
love, she had sworn to herself as often that he had been very right.

And he had been right. She said so to herself now again, though
the words which he had spoken and the things which he had done had
brought u