“All right!”—­and Robin threw back his head and laughed joyously—­ “I don’t mind!  The sensation of even imagining I’m engaged to you is quite agreeable!  For one evening, at least, I can assume a sort of proprietorship over you!  Innocent!  I—­I—­”

He looked so mirthful and mischievous that she smiled, though the teardrops still sparkled on her lashes.

“Well?  What are you thinking of now?” she asked.

“I think—­I really think—­under the circumstances I ought to kiss you!” he said—­“Don’t you feel it would be right and proper?  Even on the stage the hero and heroine act a kiss when they’re engaged!”

She met his laughing glance with quiet steadfastness.

“I cannot act a kiss,” she said—­“You can, if you like!  I don’t mind.”

“You don’t mind?”

“No.”

He looked from right to left—­the apple-boughs, loaded with rosy fruit, were intertwined above them like a canopy—­the sinking sun made mellow gold of all the air, and touched the girl’s small figure with a delicate luminance—­his heart beat, and for a second his senses swam in a giddy whirl of longing and ecstasy—­then he suddenly pulled himself together.

“Dear Innocent, I wouldn’t kiss you for the world!” he said, gently—­“It would be taking a mean advantage of you.  I only spoke in fun.  There!—­dry your pretty eyes!—­you sweet, strange, romantic little soul!  You shall have it all your own way!”

She drew a long breath of evident relief.

“Then you’ll tell your uncle—­”

“Anything you like!” he answered.  “By-the-bye, oughtn’t he to be home by this time?”

“He may have been kept by some business,” she said—­“He won’t be long now.  You’ll say we’re engaged?”

“Yes.”

“And perhaps”—­went on Innocent—­“you might ask him not to have the banns put up yet as we don’t want it known quite so soon—­”

“I’ll do all I can,” he replied, cheerily—­“all I can to keep him quiet, and to make you happy!  There!  I can’t say more!”

Her eyes shone upon him with a grateful tenderness.

“You are very good, Robin!”

He laughed.

“Good!  Not I!  But I can’t bear to see you fret—­if I had my way you should never know a moment’s trouble that I could keep from you.  But I know I’m not a patch on your old stone knight who wrote such a lot about his ’ideal’—­and yet went and married a country wench and had six children.  Don’t frown, dear!  Nothing will make me say he was romantic!  Not a bit of it!  He wrote a lot of romantic things, of course—­but he didn’t mean half of them!—­I’m sure he didn’t!”

She coloured indignantly.

“You say that because you know nothing about it,” she said—­“You have not read his writings.”