Will you promise,
dear, good friend?"
"Yes, I will promise," she answered with what was for her fervor and a
sudden look of intense relief. "I never will again, Edgar; and I am
sorry if I have hurt you at any time by what I may have said. I did not
mean to do so."
"No, I know you did not. I can appreciate your motives, and they were
good," Edgar answered with emotion; and then their two pairs of fine
blue eyes met, and both pairs were moist.
This was just at the moment when Leam, pale, rigid as a statue, thickly
veiled, and holding a box in her hand, met Mr. Gryce in Steel's Wood, he
having gone to catch such rare specimens of sleeping lepidoptera as the
place afforded and his eyes could discern.
CHAPTER XXXVIII.
BLOTTED OUT.
Gone! no one knew where. Gone in the night like a falling star, like a
passing cloud--gone and left no trace, vanished like the sunshine of
yesterday or the flowers of last spring! No one knew what had become of
her, and no one knew where to look for her; for the sole information
gathered by the scared neighbors was, that Leam Dundas was missing and
no one had seen her go.
She was thought by some to have simply run away after the manner of
undisciplined youth aiming at mock heroism; but where, or with whom?
for, said the keen-eyed women and large-mouthed men, incredulous of
maiden meditation fancy free, a pretty young thing of nineteen would
never have left her comfortable home, her father, friends and good name,
without some lover stirring in the matter.
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