“Cousin Ephraim gave me a piece of news,” he said.  “Ezra Graves got it, too.  He told us you were down in Boston at a fashionable school.  Cousin Ephraim knows a thing or two.  He says he always callated you were cut out for a fine lady.”

“Bob,” said Cynthia, nerving herself for the ordeal, “did you tell Cousin Ephraim you had seen me?”

“I told him and Ezra that I had been a constant and welcome visitor at this house.”

“Did, you tell your father that you had seen me?”

This was too serious a question to avoid.

“No, I did not.  There was no reason why I should have.”

“There was every reason,” said Cynthia, “and you know it.  Did you tell him why you came to Boston to-day?”

“No.”

“Why does he think you came?”

“He doesn’t think anything about it,” said Bob.  “He went off to Chicago yesterday to attend a meeting of the board of directors of a western railroad.”

“And so,” she said reproachfully, “you slipped off as soon as his back was turned.  I would not have believed that of you, Bob.  Do you think that was fair to him or me?”

Bob Worthington sprang to his feet and stood over her.  She had spoken to a boy, but she had aroused a man, and she felt an amazing thrill at the result.  The muscles in his face tightened, and deepened the lines about his mouth, and a fire was lighted about his eyes.

“Cynthia,” he said slowly, “even you shall not speak to me like that.  If I had believed it were right, if I had believed that it would have done any good to you or me, I should have told my father the moment I got to Brampton.  In affairs of this kind—­in a matter of so much importance in my life,” he continued, choosing his words carefully, “I am likely to know whether I am doing right or wrong.  If my mother were alive, I am sure that she would approve of this—­this friendship.”

Having got so far, he paused.  Cynthia felt that she was trembling, as though the force and feeling that was in him had charged her also.

“I did not intend to come so soon,” he went on, “but—­I had a reason for coming.  I knew that you did not want me.”

“You know that that is not true, Bob,” she faltered.  His next words brought her to her feet.

“Cynthia,” he said, in a voice shaken by the intensity of his passion, “I came because I love you better than all the world—­because I always will love you so.  I came to protect you, and care for you whatever happens.  I did not mean to tell you so, now.  But it cannot matter, Cynthia!”

He seized her, roughly indeed, in his arms, but his very roughness was a proof of the intensity of his love.  For an instant she lay palpitating against him, and as long as he lives he will remember the first exquisite touch of her firm but supple figure and the marvellous communion of her lips.  A current from the great store that was in her, pent up and all unknown, ran through him, and then she had struggled out of his arms and fled, leaving him standing alone in the parlor.