med Eloise to herself. "He
believes it! He thinks I love him! He never shall be sure of it!" And
turning once more, her face hung down and away, she laid her hand in
Marlboro's, without a word or a glance. He bent low over it in the
shadow, pressing it with his fervent lips, murmuring, "Mine! mine at
last! my own!" And St. George saw the whole.

Just then a little sail crept in sight from where they stood, winding
down the creek at the foot of the lawn.

"Oh, how delightful to be on the water to-night!" cried Laura Murray.

"You have but to command," said Mr. St. George, with a certain gayety
that seemed struck out like sparks against the flinty fact of the late
occurrence,--and half the party trooped down the turf to the shore. The
boats were afloat and laden before one knew it. Mr. Marlboro' and Eloise
were just one instant too late. Laura Murray shook a triumphant
handkerchief at them, and St. George feathered his oar, pausing a moment
as if he would return, and then gave a great sweep and his boat fairly
leaped over the water.

Mr. Marlboro' did not hesitate. There was the sail they had first seen,
now on the point of being lowered beneath the alder-bushes by the young
hunters who had sought shore for the night. Gold slipped from one hand
to another, a word, a name, and a promise. Eloise was on board,
expecting Mrs. Arles and Mrs. Houghton to follow. Marlboro' sprang upon
the end, and drew in the rope behind him, waving the other ladies a
farewell; the sails were stretched again, the rudder shipped, and wing
and wing they went skimming down the channel, past the little fleet of
wherries, ploughing the shallow current into foam and spray on their
wild career.

"Marlboro' is mad!" said St. George, with a whitening cheek.

Marlboro', standing up, one arm about the mast, and catching the slant
beam of the late-rising moon on his face, that shone awfully rapt and
intent, saluted them with an ironical cheer, and dashed on. Eloise held
the tiller for the moment, still pulsating with her late emotions, not
above a trifling play of vanity, welcoming the exhilaration of a race,
where she might half forget her trouble, and pleased with a vague
anticipation of some intervention that might recall the word which even
in these five dragging moments had already begun to corrode and eat into
her heart like a rusting fetter. The oarsmen in the wherries bent their
muscles to the strife, the boats danced over the tiny crests, the