gay, and a robin redbreast
sang a cheerful song. Beneath the rustling oak-tree there was ardent
speech on the part of MacLean, who found in his mistress a listener sweet
and shy, and not garrulous of love. But her eyes dwelt upon him and her
hand rested at ease within his clasp, and she liked to hear him speak of
the home they were to make in the wilderness. It was to be thus, and thus,
and thus! With impassioned eloquence the Gael adorned the shrine and
advanced the merit of the divinity, and the divinity listened with a
smile, a blush, a tear, and now and then a meek rebuke.

When an hour had passed, the sun went under a cloud and the air grew
colder. The bird had flown away, but in the rising wind the dead leaves
rustled loudly. MacLean and Truelove, leaving their future of honorable
toil, peace of mind, and enduring affection, came back to the present.

"I must away," said the Highlander. "Haward waits for me at Williamsburgh.
To-morrow, dearer to me than Deirdre to Naos! I will come again."

Hand in hand the two walked slowly toward that haunt of peace, Truelove's
quiet home. "And Marmaduke Haward awaits thee at Williamsburgh?" said the
Quakeress. "Last third day he met my father and me on the Fair View road,
and checked his horse and spoke to us. He is changed."

"Changed indeed!" quoth the Highlander. "A fire burns him, a wind drives
him; and yet to the world, last night"--He paused.

"Last night?" said Truelove.

"He had a large company at Marot's ordinary," went on the other. "There
were the Governor and his fellow Councilors, with others of condition or
fashion. He was the very fine gentleman, the perfect host, free, smiling,
full of wit. But I had been with him before they came. I knew the fires
beneath."

The two walked in silence for a few moments, when MacLean spoke again: "He
drank to her. At the last, when this lady had been toasted, and that, he
rose and drank to 'Audrey,' and threw his wineglass over his shoulder. He
hath done what he could. The world knows that he loves her honorably,
seeks her vainly in marriage. Something more I know. He gathered the
company together last evening that, as his guests, the highest officers,
the finest gentlemen of the colony, should go with him to the theatre to
see her for the first time as a player. Being what they were, and his
guests, and his passion known, he would insure for her, did she well or
did she ill, order, interest, decent applause." MacLean broke