As she looked through the window at the moonlight on the lawn, she thought of him; called up the vision of his tall, graceful figure and handsome face—­yes; he was handsome, she knew.  But she had scarcely given a thought to his face; and only felt that it was good to have him near her, to hear him talk in his deep voice, broken sometimes by the short laugh which sounded almost boyish.  It had been good to have him near her—­But then, she had been so lonely, had seen so few men—­scarcely any at all—­Suppose when she met him next she said “No,” told him that she could not love him, and he went away, leaving her forever; would she be sorry?

She turned away from the window suddenly, nearly stumbling over Donald, who was lying at her feet, his nose on his paws, his great eyes fixed sadly and speculatively on her face, and caught up the book.  But his face came between her and the page, and she put the book down and went into the hall.

Her father was in the library, there was no sound in the house to drown the voice, the passionately pleading voice which rang in her ears.

“I must go out,” she said, “I shall be able to think in the air, shall be able to decide.”

She caught up a shawl and flung it carelessly over her head, quite unconscious that the fleecy, rose-coloured wool made an exquisite frame for the girlish loveliness of her face, and opening the door, went slowly down the broken, lichen-covered steps, the two dogs following at her heels.

She drew in the keen but balmy air with a long breath, and looked up at the moon, now a yellow crescent in the starry sky; and something in the beauty of the night, something subtly novel thrilled her with a strange sense of throbbing, pulsing joy and happiness, underneath which lurked as subtle a fear and dread, the fear and dread of those who stand upon the threshold of the unknown; who, in passing that threshold, enter a world of strange things which they never more may leave.

Love:  what was it?  Did she feel it?  Oh, if she could only tell!  What should she say to him when she met him; and when should she meet him?  Perhaps he had come to regret his avowal to her, had been wearied and disappointed by her coldness, and would not come again!  At the thought her heart contracted as if at the touch of an icy hand.  But the next moment it leapt with a suffocating sense of mystery, of half-fearful joy, for she saw him coming across the lawn to her, and heard her name, spoken as it had never yet been spoken excepting by him; and she stood, still as a statue, as he held out his hand and, looking into her eyes, murmured her name again.

“Ida!”

CHAPTER XVIII.

“Ida!”

It was the lover’s cry of appeal, the prayer for love uttered by the heart that loves; and it went straight to her own heart.

She put out her hand, and he took it and held it in both his.