Sylvia's Lovers

'There!' said she, looking up for a moment, and half blushing; 'now

yo'll know how to do it next time.' 'I wish next time was to come now,' said Kinraid; but she had

returned to her own pail, and seemed not to hear him. He followed

her to her side of the dairy. 'I've but a short memory, can yo' not

show me again how t' hold t' strainer?' 'No,' said she, half laughing, but holding her strainer fast in

spite of his insinuating efforts to unlock her fingers. 'But there's

no need to tell me yo've getten a short memory.' 'Why? what have I done? how dun you know it?' 'Last night,' she began, and then she stopped, and turned away her

head, pretending to be busy in her dairy duties of rinsing and such

like.

'Well!' said he, half conjecturing her meaning, and flattered by it,

if his conjecture were right. 'Last night--what?' 'Oh, yo' know!' said she, as if impatient at being both literally

and metaphorically followed about, and driven into a corner.

'No; tell me,' persisted he.

'Well,' said she, 'if yo' will have it, I think yo' showed yo'd but

a short memory when yo' didn't know me again, and yo' were five

times at this house last winter, and that's not so long sin'. But I

suppose yo' see a vast o' things on yo'r voyages by land or by sea,

and then it's but natural yo' should forget.' She wished she could

go on talking, but could not think of anything more to say just

then; for, in the middle of her sentence, the flattering

interpretation he might put upon her words, on her knowing so

exactly the number of times he had been to Haytersbank, flashed upon

her, and she wanted to lead the conversation a little farther

afield--to make it a little less personal. This was not his wish,

however. In a tone which thrilled through her, even in her own

despite, he said,-'Do yo' think that can ever happen again, Sylvia?' She was quite silent; almost trembling. He repeated the question as

if to force her to answer. Driven to bay, she equivocated.

'What happen again? Let me go, I dunno what yo're talking about, and

I'm a'most numbed wi' cold.' For the frosty air came sharp in through the open lattice window,

and the ice was already forming on the milk. Kinraid would have

found a ready way of keeping his cousins, or indeed most young

women, warm; but he paused before he dared put his arm round Sylvia;

she had something so shy and wild in her look and manner; and her

very innocence of what her words, spoken by another girl, might lead

to, inspired him with respect, and kept him in check. So he

contented himself with saying,-'I'll let yo' go into t' warm kitchen if yo'll tell me if yo' think

I can ever forget yo' again.' She looked up at him defiantly, and set her red lips firm. He

enjoyed her determination not to reply to this question; it showed

she felt its significance. Her pure eyes looked steadily into his;

nor was the expression in his such as to daunt her or make her

afraid. They were like two children defying each other; each

determined to conquer. At last she unclosed her lips, and nodding

her head as if in triumph, said, as she folded her arms once more in

her check apron,-'Yo'll have to go home sometime.' 'Not for a couple of hours yet,' said he; 'and yo'll be frozen

first; so yo'd better say if I can ever forget yo' again, without

more ado.' Perhaps the fresh voices breaking on the silence,--perhaps the tones

were less modulated than they had been before, but anyhow Bell

Robson's voice was heard calling Sylvia through the second door,

which opened from the dairy to the house-place, in which her mother

had been till this moment asleep. Sylvia darted off in obedience to

the call; glad to leave him, as at the moment Kinraid resentfully

imagined. Through the open door he heard the conversation between

mother and daughter, almost unconscious of its meaning, so difficult

did he find it to wrench his thoughts from the ideas he had just

been forming with Sylvia's bright lovely face right under his eyes.