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Miss Sarah Jack, of Spanish Town
by
He turned on his heel to go away, when he caught the sound of a step following him, and a voice saying, “Oh, there is Mr. Cumming, and I want to speak to him;” and in a minute a light hand was on his arm.
“Why are you running away from us?” said Marian.
“Because–oh, I don’t know. I am not running away. You have your party made up, and I am not going to intrude on it.”
“What nonsense! Do come now; we are going to this wonderful grotto. I thought it so ill-natured of you, not joining us at dinner. Indeed you know you had promised.”
He did not answer her, but he looked at her–full in the face, with his sad eyes laden with love. She half understood his countenance, but only half understood it.
“What is the matter, Maurice?” she said. “Are you angry with me? Will you come and join us?”
“No, Marian, I cannot do that. But if you can leave them and come with me for half an hour, I will not keep you longer.”
She stood hesitating a moment, while her companion remained on the spot where she had left him. “Come, Miss Leslie,” called Captain Ewing. “You will have it dark before we can get down.”
“I will come with you,” whispered she to Maurice, “but wait a moment.” And she tripped back, and in some five minutes returned after an eager argument with her friends. “There,” she said, “I don’t care about the grotto, one bit, and I will walk with you now;– only they will think it so odd.” And so they started off together.
Before the tropical darkness had fallen upon them Maurice had told the tale of his love,–and had told it in a manner differing much from that of Marian’s usual admirers, he spoke with passion and almost with violence; he declared that his heart was so full of her image that he could not rid himself of it for one minute; “nor would he wish to do so,” he said, “if she would be his Marian, his own Marian, his very own. But if not–” and then he explained to her, with all a lover’s warmth, and with almost more than a lover’s liberty, what was his idea of her being “his own, his very own,” and in doing so inveighed against her usual light-heartedness in terms which at any rate were strong enough.
But Marian here it all well. Perhaps she knew that the lesson was somewhat deserved; and perhaps she appreciated at its value the love of such a man as Maurice Cumming, weighing in her judgment the difference between him and the Ewings and the Grahams.
And then she answered him well and prudently, with words which startled him by their prudent seriousness as coming from her. She begged his pardon heartily, she said, for any grief which she had caused him; but yet how was she to he blamed, seeing that she had known nothing of his feelings? Her father and mother had said something to her of this proposed marriage; something, but very little; and she had answered by saying that she did not think Maurice had any warmer regard for her than of a cousin. After this answer neither father nor mother had pressed the matter further. As to her own feelings she could then say nothing, for she then knew nothing;– nothing but this, that she loved no one better than him, or rather that she loved no one else. She would ask herself if she could love him; but he must give her some little time for that. In the meantime–and she smiled sweetly at him as she made the promise–she would endeavour to do nothing that would offend him; and then she added that on that evening she would dance with him any dances that he liked. Maurice, with a self-denial that was not very wise, contented himself with engaging her for the first quadrille.