"You blind lass, can you not see a little in my wretched heart?
Do you think when I set there, reading in that fool-book that I have just burned and be damned to it, I take ever the least thought of any stricken thing but just yourself?
Night after night I could have grat to see you sitting there your lone.

And what was I to do?
You are here under my honour; would you punish me for that?
Is it for that that you would spurn a loving servant ?" At the word, with a small, sudden motion, she clung near to me.

I raised her face to mine, I kissed it, and she bowed her brow upon my bosom, clasping me tight.

I sat in a mere whirl like a man drunken.

Then I heard her voice sound very small and muffled in my clothes.
"Did you kiss her truly ?" she asked.
There went through me so great a heave of surprise that I was all shook with it.
"Miss Grant!" I cried, all in a disorder.