Tears of sorrow and reproach were lurking in her soft dark eyes, until in fewest words I told her that my seeming negligence was nothing but my bitter loss and wretched absence far away; of which I had so vainly striven to give any tidings without danger to her.
When she heard all this, and saw what I had brought from London (which was nothing less than a ring of pearls with a sapphire in the midst of them, as pretty as could well be found), she let the gentle tears flow fast, and came and sat so close beside me, that Itrembled like a folded sheep at the bleating of her lamb. But recovering comfort quickly, without more ado, I raised her left hand and observed it with a nice regard, wondering at the small blue veins, and curves, and tapering whiteness, and the points it finished with. My wonder seemed to please her much, herself so well accustomed to it, and not fond of watching it.
And then, before she could say a word, or guess what Iwas up to, as quick as ever I turned hand in a bout of wrestling, on her finger was my ring--sapphire for the veins of blue, and pearls to match white fingers.
'Oh, you crafty Master Ridd!' said Lorna, looking up at me, and blushing now a far brighter blush than when she spoke of Charlie; 'I thought that you were much too simple ever to do this sort of thing. No wonder you can catch the fish, as when first I saw you.'
'Have I caught you, little fish? Or must all my life be spent in hopeless angling for you?'
'Neither one nor the other, John! You have not caught me yet altogether, though I like you dearly John; and if you will only keep away, I shall like you more and more. As for hopeless angling, John--that all others shall have until I tell you otherwise.'
With the large tears in her eyes--tears which seemed to me to rise partly from her want to love me with the power of my love--she put her pure bright lips, half smiling, half prone to reply to tears, against my forehead lined with trouble, doubt, and eager longing.
And then she drew my ring from off that snowy twig her finger, and held it out to me; and then, seeing how my face was falling, thrice she touched it with her lips, and sweetly gave it back to me. 'John, I dare not take it now; else I should be cheating you. I will try to love you dearly, even as you deserve and wish. Keep it for me just till then. Something tells me I shall earn it in a very little time. Perhaps you will be sorry then, sorry when it is all too late, to be loved by such as I am.'
What could I do at her mournful tone, but kiss a thousand times the hand which she put up to warn me, and vow that I would rather die with one assurance of her love, than without it live for ever with all beside that the world could give? Upon this she looked so lovely, with her dark eyelashes trembling, and her soft eyes full of light, and the colour of clear sunrise mounting on her cheeks and brow, that I was forced to turn away, being overcome with beauty.
'Dearest darling, love of my life,' I whispered through her clouds of hair; 'how long must I wait to know, how long must I linger doubting whether you can ever stoop from your birth and wondrous beauty to a poor, coarse hind like me, an ignorant unlettered yeoman--'
'I will not have you revile yourself,' said Lorna, very tenderly--just as I had meant to make her. 'You are not rude and unlettered, John. You know a great deal more than I do; you have learned both Greek and Latin, as you told me long ago, and you have been at the very best school in the West of England. None of us but my grandfather, and the Counsellor (who is a great scholar), can compare with you in this. And though Ihave laughed at your manner of speech, I only laughed in fun, John; I never meant to vex you by it, nor knew that it had done so.'
'Naught you say can vex me, dear,' I answered, as she leaned towards me in her generous sorrow; 'unless you say "Begone, John Ridd; I love another more than you."'
'Then I shall never vex you, John. Never, I mean, by saying that. Now, John, if you please, be quiet--'
For I was carried away so much by hearing her calling me 'John' so often, and the music of her voice, and the way she bent toward me, and the shadow of soft weeping in the sunlight of her eyes, that some of my great hand was creeping in a manner not to be imagined, and far less explained, toward the lithesome, wholesome curving underneath her mantle-fold, and out of sight and harm, as I thought; not being her front waist. However, Iwas dashed with that, and pretended not to mean it;only to pluck some lady-fern, whose elegance did me no good.
'Now, John,' said Lorna, being so quick that not even a lover could cheat her, and observing my confusion more intently than she need have done. 'Master John Ridd, it is high time for you to go home to your mother. Ilove your mother very much from what you have told me about her, and I will not have her cheated.'
'If you truly love my mother,' said I, very craftily 'the only way to show it is by truly loving me.'
Upon that she laughed at me in the sweetest manner, and with such provoking ways, and such come-and-go of glances, and beginning of quick blushes, which she tried to laugh away, that I knew, as well as if she herself had told me, by some knowledge (void of reasoning, and the surer for it), I knew quite well, while all my heart was burning hot within me, and mine eyes were shy of hers, and her eyes were shy of mine;for certain and for ever this I knew--as in a glory--that Lorna Doone had now begun and would go on to love me.
