The Honorable Peter Stirling and What People Thought of Him Part 97

"I'm going to have it made into a plain gold ring," replied Peter, "and when I give it to you, I shall have all your luck."

Then came a silence.

Finally Peter said, "Will you please tell me what you meant by talking about five years!"

"Oh! Really, Peter," Leonore hastened to explain, in an anxious way, as if Peter had charged her with murder or some other heinous crime. "I did think so. I didn't find it out till--till that night. Really! Won't you believe me?"

Peter smiled. He could have believed anything.

"Now," he said, "I know at last what Anarchists are for."

His ready acceptance of her statement made Leonore feel a slight p.r.i.c.k of conscience. She said: "Well--Peter--I mean--that is--at least, I did sometimes think before then--that when I married, I'd marry you--but I didn't think it would come so soon. Did you? I thought we'd wait. It would have been so much more sensible!"

"I've waited a long time," said Peter.

"Poor dear!" said Leonore, putting her other hand over Peter's, which held hers.

Peter enjoyed this exquisite pleasure in silence for a time, but the enjoyment was too great not to be expressed So he said;

"I like your hands almost as much as your eyes."

"That's very nice," said Leonore.

"And I like the way you say 'dear,'" said Peter. "Don't you want to say it again?"

"No, I hate people who say the same thing twice."

Then there was a long pause.

"What poor things words are?" said Peter, at the end of it.

"I know just what you mean," said Leonore.

Clearly they both meant what they said, for there came another absence of words. How long the absence would have continued is a debatable point. Much too soon a door opened.

"h.e.l.lo!" said a voice. "Back already? What kind of an evening had you?"

"A very pleasant one," said Peter, calmly, yet expressively.

"Let go my hand, Peter, please," a voice whispered imploringly. "Oh, please! I can't to-night. Oh, please!"

"Say 'dear,'" whispered Peter, meanly.

"Please, dear," said Leonore. Then Leonore went towards the stairs hurriedly.

"Not off already, Dot, surely?"

"Yes. I'm going to bed."

"Come and have a cigar, Peter," said Watts, walking towards the library.

"In a moment," said Peter. He went to the foot of the stairs and said, "Please, dear," to the figure going up.

"Well?" said the figure.

Peter went up five steps. "Please," he begged.

"No," said the figure, "but there is my hand."

So Peter turned the little soft palm uppermost and kissed it Then he forgot the cigar and Watts. He went to his room, and thought of--of his birthday gift.

CHAPTER LIX.

"GATHER YE ROSEBUDS WHILE YE MAY."

If Peter had roamed about the hall that evening, he was still more restless the next morning. He was down early, though for no apparent reason, and did nothing but pa.s.s from hall to room, and room to hall, spending most of his time in the latter, however.

How Leonore could have got from her room into the garden without Peter's seeing her was a question which puzzled him not a little, when, by a chance glance out of a window, he saw that personage clipping roses off the bushes. He did not have time to spare, however, to reason out an explanation. He merely stopped roaming, and went out to--to the roses.

"Good-morning," said Leonore pleasantly, though not looking at Peter, as she continued her clipping.

Peter did not say anything for a moment. Then he asked, "Is that all?"

"I don't know what you mean," said Leonore, innocently. "Besides, someone might be looking out of a window."

Peter calmly took hold of the basket to help Leonore sustain its enormous weight. "Let me help you carry it," he said.

"Very well," said Leonore. "But there's no occasion to carry my hand too. I'm not decrepit."

"I hoped I was helping you," said Peter.

"You are not. But you may carry the basket, since you want to hold something."

"Very well," said Peter meekly.

"Do you know," said Leonore, as she snipped, and dropped roses into the basket, "you are not as obstinate as people say you are."

"Don't deceive yourself on that score," said Peter.

"Well! I mean you are not absolutely determined to have your own way."

"I never give up my own views," said Peter, "unless I can see more to be gained by so doing. To that extent I am not at all obstinate."

"Suppose," said Leonore, "that you go and cut the roses on those furthest bushes while I go in and arrange these?"