Bylow Hill | Page 7

gradually down along the hill's steep face to reach the town and the
river meadows. Godfrey, halting before Ruth and her brother, watched
the blooming hawthorn, over there, bend and shake and straighten and
bend again, above Arthur's unseen hands. Then, glancing furtively back
toward Mrs. Morris, he muttered to Ruth, while Leonard gravely

looked out across the landscape, "I live and learn."
"So we learn to live," was Ruth's playful reply. To her it was painfully
clear that Mrs. Morris, very sweetly no doubt, had eluded Godfrey's
endeavors to inform her of anything not to his brother's unqualified
praise. In the Bylow Hill group, Ruth had a way of smiling abstractedly,
which was very dear to Godfrey even when it meant he had best say no
more; and this smile had just said this to him when Isabel and Arthur
came into view again. As the two and the three drifted toward each
other, Ruth let Leonard outstep her, and joined Godfrey with a light in
her face that quickened his pulse.
After a word or two of slight import she said, as they slowly walked,
"Godfrey."
"Yes," eagerly responded the lover.
"Down in the garden, awhile ago--did I--promise something?"
"You most certainly did!" She had promised that if he would let a
certain subject drop she would bring it up again, herself, before he must
take his leave.
"And must you go very soon, now?" she asked.
"I've only a few minutes left," said the lover, with a lover's license.
"Well, I'm ready to speak. Of course, Godfrey, I know my heart."
The young man smiled ruefully. "I've known mine till I'm dead tired of
the acquaintance."
Other words passed, her eyes on the ground as they loitered, and after a
pause she murmured:--"But I've known my heart as long as you've
known yours."
"You've known--What do you--Oh, Ruth, look at me!"
She looked, very tenderly, although she said, "You forget we are
observed."
"Oh, observed! Do you mean hope--for me--after all?"
"I mean that if you will only wait until we can get a clear light on this
matter of Isabel's--which will most likely be by the next time you
come"--
"Oh, Ruth, Ruth, my own Ruth at last!"
"Please don't speak so. I'm not engaging myself to you now."
"Oh yes, you are! Yes, you are! Yes--you--are!"
"No--no--no--listen! Listen to me, Godfrey. I think that now, among us
all, we shall manage Isabel's affair well enough, and that the very next

time--you--come"--She began absently to pick her steps.
"What--what then?"
"Then you may ask me."
The response of the overjoyed lover was but one or two passionate
words, and her sufficient reply, as they halted among their fellows, was
to look across the valley with her meditative smile. Isabel took note,
but kindly gave a long sigh of admiration, and with an exalted sweep of
the hand drew the gaze of the five to the beauties of the scene below.
The day was near its end. The long shadow of the great cliff behind
Bylow Hill hung over the roofs of the town and over the hither
meadows. The sun's rays were laying their last touches upon the
winding river, and upon the grainfields that extended from its farther
shore. In the upper blue rested a few peaceful clouds, changing from
silver to pink, from pink to pearly gray, and on the skyline crouched in
a purpling haze the round-backed mountains of another county.
To Mrs. Morris and the General the sight, from the old elm-tree seat,
was even fairer than to the youthful group whose forms stood out
against the sky, the floral colors of the girls' draperies heightened by
the western light. For a while the two sitters gave the perfect scene the
tribute of a perfect silence, and then the General asked, as he cautiously
straightened his impaired frame, "Has not Isabel been making
some--eh--news for herself--and us?"
The lady's lips parted for their peculiar laugh of embarrassment, but the
questioner's smile was so serious that she forced her sweetest gravity.
"Why, General, according to our Southern ways," she said,--every word
mellowed by her Southern way of saying it,--"that's for Isabel to tell
you."
"Then why does she not do it, Mrs. Morris?" asked the veteran, who
had been district attorney himself once upon a time, and was clever
with witnesses.
"Why, really, General, Isabel hasn't had a cha--Oh! ho, ho! I oughtn't to
have said that!" Mrs. Morris had a killing dimple, but never used it.
"I suppose--of course"--said the General, "she will say
it's--eh--Arthur?"
"Now you're making me tell," she laughed, "and I mustn't! General,
Godfrey seems to be going."
In fact, Godfrey was shaking hands with Ruth and Leonard. Now he

took the hands of Arthur and Isabel together, and Mrs. Morris laughed