Year: 1868

looked up at me, his face seemed
quite changed. All the anger had
disappeared; the fierce fire had gone
out of his eyes, and then, heart-broken
indeed, he said:


"Do you think that | loved that
dead woman up stairs Z"


In an instant, from that one SEN
tence and the manner in which 1t was
spoken, all my private doubts and un-
certain fears assumed a real shape,
and | felt that | was destined to hear
a dreadful story. | will tell this sto-
ry as he told it to me in the house to
which he had brought his wife only a
year ago, and from which she was soon
to be carried away and be buried out
of sight.


"one was my cousin" he began; Il
suppose you know that. We began
by playing at making love, when we
were boy and girl, on the sly. We
knew perfectly well that her father
would rather see his daughter dead
than married to me, and my father was
strongly prejudiced against cousin
marriages. But | suppose that these
objections made US all the more in
clined to play at love making. 1t was,
in some sort Of way. exciting to carry
on our little flirtations under the eyes
of our parents, but still under the
rose.


We were thrown very much togeth-
er. | spent all my holidays at Crav-
en- Court, and all my quiet hours at
school were occupied in recollections
of the delightful days spent there
Very soon | felt that | was not play
ing at making love. She seemed,
somehow, to belong to me.


Why | loved her when she was but
mere child! Little notes were
smuggled under her door at night
time. Little locks of her sunny hair
were cut off and hidden away in an
old pocket-book, which never left me
night or day when | was at school.
1t was calf love, Isuppose-a kind Of
affection that big folks sneer at; but
Eli swear that it was the purest love
that was given to girl.


She liked teasing me. You know
how girls like to tease boys; the girls,
who for their age are so unnaturally
forward; the boys, who, parado4ical
as 1t may seem, are SO feminine and
shy. She could dance and hold her
way with men twice her own age in a
ballroom, while could only wish to
heaven | did not feel so awkward and
such a fool, as | stood between the
folding doors watching her croquet-
ting with the humble bunch Of vioets
| had gathered for her in the dew, two
She had taken those same violets
when gathered, and kissed them; but
now she was playing the woman and
| was a foolish awkward lad, standing
between the folding doors. and hating
every one who touched her hand.


We were both in the hobbledehoy
stage Of our existence, she awkward
and ungainly, and | rough and uncut
tivated, when began to understand
what a strange, whimsical, variable
disposition she had. Walking out
alone she would burst out crying, and
complain that we were separated for
so long a time, filling me with wild,
enthusiastic notions of becoming a
great man for her sake; and then in
the evening she would turn icy cold,
and imply in the general conversation
that cousins were cousins, and that
was all.


Perhaps this was wise on her part,
ana showed unusual discretion. |
persuaded myself at the time that it
was both wise and discreet, but then
my eyes were not yet opened.


Years after that We really did love.
At last | was binder than ever; but
| will tell you how we acted, in order
that you may see how much dust was
thrown in my eyes. ..I


And here | must tell you the stran-
gest part of this strange story as it
seems to me. No man in the world
is more sensitive than | am. | am
over sensitive and to a fault; crying
very often for an imaginary moon,
when the moon is not so very far off
after all, and coming and creating diff
ficulties which ought never to have ex-
listed. | mention this to show that |
am not constituted like one of those
thick-skinned, obtuse fellows one
meets with occasionally, who love so
blindly that they are ignorant alto
gether of woman witness and fnesse,
and would go on loving in heavy,
lethargic manner, though the whole
world sees at a glance that their Om-
phales are deliberately sending them
to sleep in order to rob them of their
strength for a whim. | was at On
phale'S feet--I don't deny it for mo-
ment; but the first snip of the scissors
would have awakened me from the
poppiest of slumbers.


If | were to own that | was a fool,
| should be cutting at once at the root
of my story. | don't understand the
meaning of what / tell you, any more
than you will be likely to understand
it. | give you the facts, and must
leave you to unravel the mystery.


We were both of US in our plain
senses, quite grown up by this time,
and able to think for ourselves; and
now l will tell you what we did one
spring time down at Craven Court.


She had grown into finely shaped
woman. Not beautifully no means