“So strange,” resumed he, “that had any one said to me, 'Beecher, you 'll spend a couple of months in a little German inn, with nothing to do, nothing to see, and, what's more, it will not bore you,' I 'd have answered, 'Take you fifty to one in hundreds on the double event,--thousands if you like it better,'--and see, hang me if I should n't have lost!” “Perhaps not. If you had a heavy wager on the matter, it is likely you would not have come.” “Who knows! Everything is Fate in this world. Ah, you may laugh; but it is, though. What else, I ask you--what brings you here just now?--why am I walking along the river with you beside me?” “Partly, because, I hope, you find it pleasant,” said she, with a droll gravity, while something in her eyes seemed to betoken that her own thoughts amused her. “There must be more than that,” said he, thoughtfully, for he felt the question a knotty one, and rather liked to show that he did not skulk the encounter with such difficulties. “Partly, perhaps, because it pleases _me_,” said she, in the same quiet tone. He shook his head doubtingly; he had asked for an explanation, and neither of these supplied that want. “At all events, Lizzy, there is one thing you will admit,--if it is Fate, one can't help it,--eh?” “If you mean by that that you must walk along here at my side, whether you will or not, just try, for experiment's sake, if you could not cross over the stream and leave me to go back alone.” “Leave _you_ to go back alone!” cried he, upon whom the last words were ever the most emphatic. “But why so, Lizzy; are you angry with me?--are you weary of me?” “No, I 'm not angry with you,” said she, gently. “Wearied, then--tired of me--bored?” “Must I pay you compliments on your agreeability, Mr. Beecher?” “There it is again,” broke he in, pettishly. “It was only yesterday you consented to call me Annesley, and you have gone back from it already,--forgotten it all!” “No, I forget very seldom--unfortunately.” This last word was uttered to herself and for herself. “You will call me Annesley, then?” asked he, eagerly. “Yes, if you wish it,--Annesley.” There was a pause before she spoke the last word; and when she did utter it, her accent faltered slightly, and a faint blush tinged her cheek. As for Beecher, his heart swelled high and proudly; he felt at that moment a strange warm glow within him that counterfeited courage; for an instant he thought he would have liked something perilous to confront,--something in encountering which he might stand forth before Lizzy as a Paladin. Was it that some mysterious voice within him whispered, “She loves you; her heart is yours”? and, oh, if so, what a glorious sentiment must there be in that passion, if love can move a nature like this, and mould it to one great or generous ambition!