Part 19 (1/2)

”There is one thing you _can_ do,” he said, with an att.i.tude of deep dejection. ”You can tell me if you love me.”

She tossed her head with a feminine movement that was wholly charming.

”Yes, I could tell you that, but it would be a very improper thing, under the circ.u.mstances, provided I was able to give you the answer you seem to wish. If I did care for you, would I like to say so in definite words when anything further might turn out to be impossible? A girl would not wish to have a man that she was never to marry going about with the recollection that she said, 'I love you.'”

”Then you can say nothing at all?” he asked sadly. ”Shall I be uncertain whether at the end of my term in purgatory I am to be raised to a state of bliss or dashed into the Inferno?”

She laughed; a delicious little laugh.

”You are getting hyperbolical,” she answered. ”There are ten thousand better women than I.”

”But I don't want them,” pleaded the young man. ”Did you ever read the lines of Jean Ingelow:

”'Oh so many, many, many Maids and yet my heart undone.

What to me are all or any?

I have lost--my--one.'”

Daisy replied that the sentiment was very sweet, and added that when a lover could quote such admirable poetry with accuracy, there was hope for him. Do what he would, Roseleaf could not make her see that everything in his future life depended on ”one little word” from her.

She persisted that he was misled by the violence of his first affection, and that if he would only let a month or two pa.s.s he would discover that his pulse would fall off a number of beats to the minute.

”And is that what you want?” he asked, reproachfully. ”Would you like to have me come back two months later, and tell you my love had ceased?”

”Yes, if it was the truth. How much better than to learn it after my vows had been pledged and I was bound to you for the rest of my days!”

He rose and went with quick steps to her side, catching up her hand and covering it with kisses. She did her best to stop him, whispering, with a glance toward the door, that they might be interrupted at any minute.

”By whom!” he retorted, stung at her coldness. ”Your sister has gone up stairs, and there is no one else in the house.”

”Hannibal might come in,” she said, in a low tone. ”He has no way of knowing that I do not wish to be interrupted.”

He grew angry at the mention of that name. But the warning had its effect and he sat down, nearer to her than before, his heart beating rapidly.

”I hate the fellow!” he exclaimed bitterly. ”It is a good thing I am going away, or I should strike him some day for his insolence!”

Daisy paled at the vehemence of her companion.

”Has he been insolent to you?” she murmured.

”To me? He would not dare! What angers me is the way he speaks to the rest of you. He came with your cloak that night, acting as if he was your master, instead of your servant. I have heard him speak to Mr.

Fern in a way that made me want to kick him! Why does your father bear it? Why do you? Has Hannibal some mysterious hold on his situation?”

The girl heard him patiently, though the roses did not come at once to her white cheek.

”I am afraid,” she said, when he had finished his tirade, ”that you despise him for his color. It is a prejudice that seems to me--and to my father--unchristian and uncharitable. Perhaps, in the anxiety to make Hannibal forget that G.o.d gave him a darker skin than ours, we may have gone to the other extreme, and treated him with too great consideration.

But I think you overstate the case.”