He then mounted the pony, which had been waiting for
him more than half an hour.
"But it is five o'clock," said Lucy; "you will be too late for
dinner."
"Dinner be dem--d," drawled the man of action, and rode off like a
flash.
"It is to be, then," said Lucy, and her heart ebbed. It had ebbed and
flowed a good many times in the last hour or two.
Captain Kenealy reappeared in the middle of dinner. Lucy scanned his
face, but it was like the outside of a copy-book, and she was on
thorns. Being too late, he lost his place near her at dinner, and she
could not whisper to him. However, when the ladies retired he opened
the door, and Lucy let fall a word at his feet: "Come up before the
rest."
Acting on this order, Kenealy came up, and found Lucy playing sad
tunes softly on the piano and Mrs. Bazalgette absent. She was trying
something on upstairs. He gave Lucy a note from Mrs. Wilson. She
opened it, and the joyful color suffused her cheek, and she held out
her hand to him; but, as she turned her head away mighty prettily at
the same time, she did not see the captain was proffering a second
document, and she was a little surprised when, instead of a warm
grasp, all friendship and no love, a piece of paper was shoved into
her delicate palm. She took it; looked first at Kenealy, then at it,
and was sore puzzled.
The document was in Kenealy's handwriting, and at first Lucy thought
it must be intended as a mere specimen of caligraphy; for not only was
it beautifully written, but in letters of various sizes.
Pages:
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