Unfastening this, she
handed to me the necklet, to which was attached a locket enamelled in
black. It is no exaggeration to say, as I took this piece of personal
property, my hand trembled so much that I could not open the case.
True love is always bashful, and I loved the girl, whose slender
neck the chain had caressed, so madly and senselessly, if you will,
that I felt as if the trinket were a living thing, a part and parcel
of herself.
"Let me unfasten it," she said, unconscious that aught save awkwardness
affected my manipulation of the spring. And she took the locket and
handed it back to me open, wet with tears--her tears.
Judge how hard it was for me then to keep my promise to Mr. Craven and
myself--how hard it was to refrain from telling her all my reasons for
having ever undertaken to fight the dragon installed at River Hall.
I thank God I did refrain. Had I spoken then, had I presumed upon her
sorrow and her simplicity, I should have lost something which
constitutes the sweetest memory of my life.
But that is in the future of this story, and meantime I was looking at
the face of her father.
I looked at it long and earnestly; then I closed the locket, softly
pressing down the spring as I did so, and gave back miniature and chain
into her hand.
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