Four Canadian Highwaymen | Page 3

book.'
'Oh, indeed. I have been reading here during the greater part of the
afternoon. Mr. Gray, let me introduce to you Mr. Ham; Mr. Ham, Mr.
Gray.' Roland bowed with much politeness; but Ham's stiff, pompous
bend was an assertion of superiority.
'I have probably broken in upon your _tete-a-tete_ with this young man,
Aster; so I'll take a turn out and have a jaw with your guv'nor.' In a
moment he was gone.
'This is your next door neighbour, I presume, Miss Aster?'
'Yes; he and papa are great friends. He consults papa upon nearly
everything that he does upon his farm; and papa in turn consults him
concerning our affairs.'
'I suspected as much. I presume that you and he are very intimate
friends. I observe that he calls you "Aster."'
'I did not ask him to do so; and since he chooses to adopt this familiar
fashion I cannot well rebuke him, papa and he are such friends.'
'Then do you permit me to call you Aster?'
'O indeed, I wish that you would do it; and all the time.' As she said this
her eyes brightened.
'Thanks, Aster. I now feel that I am on equal footing with the rest. You
are sure that you will not mind me Astering you before _him_? Doing
it frequently?'
'Not a bit. I shall be pleased; I shall be very much pleased, because he
seemed to take a pleasure in being familiar before you. And we are not
such great friends after all.'
'You most not talk nonsense, Aster. It would never do to allow yonder
well-tilled acres, that sumptuous dwelling, all those flocks of sheep,

and herds of sleek cattle to pass into the hands of any other girl.
Imagine pulling down the boundary line and joining the two farms into
one! Imagine how your "guv'nor"--as this well-bred Mr. Ham styles
him--would open his eyes if any other person should nave the temerity
to ask for Miss Aster.'
'Then would you be really glad to see these two farms joined in one?
To see me marry Mr. Ham?' Her tremulous eyes questioned his face
eagerly. When she began her queries there was in them a flash of
mocking mirth; but that had disappeared, and there was now only to be
observed a grave, questioning expression there.
My reader is probably desirous of hearing something about Aster's face,
notwithstanding the assumption that it was beautiful. As a rule we
expect to find chestnut eyes with ruddy-golden hair; but this was not
the fact in Aster's case. Her eyes were the colour which men like
Theophile Gauthier attribute to Venus: they were not blue, neither were
they brown; but they presented in the most fascinating ensemble a grey
which at night was a fathomless dusk, and by day that green which you
perceive where the sea is a hundred fathoms deep. With the light upon
her eye there was a glint of emerald, that witching glare which made
Becky Sharpe irresistible. Now imagine an eyebrow, dark as the raven's
quill, overarching such an eye, and contrasting itself with the burning
gold of the hair, and a skin of Parian white and purity. Then
contemplate a softness beside which the velvet upon the petal of a
pansy would seem rigid; and this eye large and timorous, and fringed
with long, dark lashes!
I do not like the work of cataloguing 'divine wares,' especially when my
most elaborate estimate must present a picture crude and mathematical
compared with the ideal.
This girl's nose was Roman in type; and was precisely like that which
the engraver gives to Annette Marton. The nostrils were finely chiselled,
betokening sensitiveness: and I may add that I have never known
anybody with a thick nostril to be sensitive.
For a moment Roland's eyes were fixed wistfully upon the girl's, and he

did not answer her question. But escape from the enquiring, unflinching
stare was out of the question; so he said, mustering all the courage that
he could:
'Well, to tell you the truth, Aster, I think you are twenty times too good
for this fellow Ham; and therefore I should not like to see you marry
him; to see the two farms become one.'
'Oh, I did not think that you considered me in any sense a superior girl;
and I must feel highly flattered that you put a higher price upon that
superiority than upon the splendid property adjoining my father's.'
There was now the merest glint of mischief in her glance; and she was
evidently desirous that Mr. Gray should be more explicit in his
objection to the match. 'Does Mr. Gray realize what a great compliment
he has paid me, a poor rustic, an untutored country girl, with a little
knowledge about the bees