John Henry Smith Part 42

"I think I will go and call on them," I said.

"Call on who? Oh, yes!" he said, as I started away.

"By the way, you won't find Grace there, come to think of it. Let's see; where did she say she was going? She's painting the ruins, and has finished the old cathedral and the monastery. What's that other famous wreck around here? Oh, yes; the castle! I remember now that she said she was going to paint the castle to-day. Somebody ought to paint it. I understand it hasn't been painted for more than eight hundred years."

His roar of laughter sounded like old Woodvale days.

"What's your hurry?" he asked. "Tell you what let's do! I'll fit you out with a set of clubs and we'll play a few holes on the second course.

Then we'll go to the hotel, talk over the news with the women folks, and this afternoon we'll drag Carter away from his bride, and you and he can play Tom Morris and me a foursome! How does that strike you?"

"I cannot play this forenoon," I promptly said. "I must attend to my luggage, shave, write some letters, send telegrams and--and do a lot of things."

"How about this afternoon?" he asked. "We start at three o'clock."

"I'll be on hand," I promised, desperately.

"All right, and don't fail," he cautioned me. "You would not believe it, Smith, but I have got so that I can line 'em out from one hundred and--"

I turned and left him with those unknown yards poised on his lips. When at a safe distance I looked back and saw him gazing at me with an att.i.tude and expression of dumb wonder.

I retained the services of a red-headed and freckled-faced boy who was confident he could direct me to the ruins of the old castle. It was not a long walk, and when he pointed them out in the distance I gladdened his heart and brought a grin to his tanned face by giving him a half-crown as I dismissed him.

I was within sight of my fate! My steps faltered as I neared the grim arches, and once I stopped and tried to plan how I should act and what I should say. But I could think of nothing, and mustering all my courage and invoking the G.o.d of luck, I went on.

In a few minutes I stood within the shadow of the gray and crumbling walls, undecided which way to turn. Picking my way over fallen masonry, I turned the corner of a huge pile which seemed as if it might crash to earth at any moment.

And then I saw her!

She was seated at an easel, a small canvas in front of her. Her hat was lying on a rock near by, and the breeze had toyingiy disarranged the dark tresses of her hair.

She was looking out over the ocean, a brush idly poised in her hand. I saw the profile of her sweet face as I stood motionless for an instant, not five yards away.

"Grace!" I softly said.

That easel with its unfinished canvas was tipped to the rocks as with a startled cry she sprang to her feet. For one agonising moment I gazed into her startled eyes and saw her quivering lips.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "And then I saw her!"]

"Jack!" she cried, and we were in each other's arms.

I cannot write what we did or said during the first sweet minutes which followed, for I do not know. I only know that we told each other the most rapturous news which comes to mortal ears. Oh, the wonder of it!

We lived and we loved! This great earth with its blue-domed sky, its fields, its flowers and its heaving seas became ours to enjoy "till death us do part!"

There we sat amid the ruins where kings and queens had been born; where they had lived, loved and died centuries agone. Their ashes mingled with the dust from which they sprang; of their pomp and splendour naught remained save the walls which crumbled over our heads; since their time the world had been born anew, but the G.o.d of Love who came to them now smiled on us, his heart as youthful, his figure as beautiful and his ardour as strong as when he whispered sweet words into the ears of the lovers who dwelt in Eden.

I had forgotten that we ever had quarrelled. As we sat there looking out on the sea it seemed as if we had always known of each other's love.

"Sweetheart," I asked, "when did you first know that I loved you?"

"When I became angry at you," she replied.

"When you became angry at me?" I repeated, and then the thought of the anguish through which I had pa.s.sed recalled itself.

"Darling!" I exclaimed, "why did you treat me so? What had I done?

Sweetheart, you do not know how I have suffered!"

"But you must have known all the time that I loved you," she said, a strange smile on her lips.

"How could I know?" I faltered.

"Could you not tell?" she asked, lifting her dancing eyes to mine. "Who was the inspired author of lines which run like this: 'I have received that glorious message! Grace Harding loves me! The message was transmitted from the depths of her beautiful eyes! It has been confirmed by the gentle pressure of her hand as it rested on my arm! It has been echoed in the accents of her sweet voice! I have read it in the blush which mantles her cheek as I draw near, and I know it from a thousand little tokens which my heart understands and which my feeble words cannot express. I am--'"

'"I am an a.s.s,' is the amended and proper ending of that sentence," I humbly said. "I beg of you, tell me how you ever came to see those words from my miserable diary!"

"It makes me mad even now when I think of it!" she declared, vainly attempting to release her hand. "You great big stupid; do you not know what you did?"

"I only know that I wrote those vain-glorious lines and that you must have read them," I said.

"I did not read them! Oh, I could box your ears! While you were composing that rhapsody Mr. Chilvers and others came along and asked you to play golf with them. Golf being more important than anything else on earth, you rushed up stairs for your clubs and left that diary on the table. Do you remember that on your way to the first-tee you met Miss Ross, Miss Dangerfield and me?"

I remember it.

"When we arrived on the veranda," she continued with rising indignation, "Miss Dangerfield picked up that literary treasure of yours and of course opened it to the page from which I have been quoting. And then she read it to us! I never was so mortified and angry in my life. I rushed away from them, and when you found me I was so angry that I could have killed you. It was not a declaration of your love for me; it was a declaration of my love for you!"

I could not help laughing, and then she did box my ears.

"That little minx of a Miss Dangerfield busied herself until your return from your golf game in copying from your diary its choicest extracts,"

continued Grace, after we had "made up," "but I managed to get them away from her, and I have them yet. Some of them were--well, they were nicer than the one Miss Dangerfield read."

"Which one, for instance?"

"I won't flatter your vanity by repeating them. But when I received your letter and had thought it over several days I decided to forgive you, Jack, and so I wrote you that letter."

"But I never received a letter from you!" I exclaimed.

On comparing dates we found that I had left Albuquerque before the letter could arrive there, and that it probably had not been forwarded to Woodvale in time so that I would get it prior to my sailing.

"It was a cold and formal letter," she said, trying to look severe.

"I don't care anything about the old letter, sweetheart," I declared, "now that I have found you."

And then we laughed and cried and were very happy. It seems that Miss Dangerfield gave the diary to the steward, who must have sent it to my rooms, for I have no recollection of missing it at any time.

We talked of many, many things as we sat there within the shadows of the old castle.

"Oh, Jack!" she suddenly exclaimed, "we must secure an invitation for you to the wedding."

"Ours, dearest?" I innocently asked. "Do I need an invitation?"