"
"Ye're no angry at me, Aggie?" said Cosmo, almost timidly.
"Angry at ye, my bonny lad!" cried Aggie, and looking up with a
world of tenderness in her eyes, and a divine glow of affection,
for hers was the love so sure of itself that it maketh not ashamed,
she threw her two strong, shapely honest arms round his neck; he
bent his head, she kissed him heartily on the mouth, and burst into
tears. Surely but for that other love that lay patient and hopeless
in the depth of Cosmo's heart, he would now have loved Aggie in a
way to satisfy her, and to justify him in saying he loved her! And
to that it might have come in time, but where is the use of saying
what might have been, when all things are ever moving towards the
highest and best for the individual as well as for the universe!
--not the less that hell may be the only path to it for some--the
hell of an absolute self-loathing.
Just at that moment, who should appear on the top of a broken mound
of the moorland, where she stood in the light of the setting sun,
but Elsie, neatly dressed, glowing and handsome! A moment she
stood, then descended, a dark scorn shadowing in her eyes, and a
smile on her mouth showing the whitest of teeth.
"Mr. Warlock," she said, and took no notice of his humble
companion, "my father sent me after you in a hurry as you may see,"
--and she heaved a deep breath--"to say he doesn't think the bear
o' the Gowan Brae,'ill be fit for cutting this two days, an'
they'll gang to the corn upo' the heuch instead.
Pages:
607
608
609
610
611
612
613
614
615
616
617
618
619
620
621
622
623
624
625
626
627
628
629
630
631