"Partly, I think," replies Esther, nonchalantly. "It seems as if all my life I had seen and heard of nothing but Glan-yr-Afon and Plas Berwyn, Plas Berwyn and Glan-yr-Afon, and now I'm going to see and hear something fresh; it may be better and it may be worse; but, at all events, it will be something different. Perhaps I shall come back as the country mouse did, more in love than ever with my own cheeseparings and tallow-candle ends; perhaps"--swinging her Sunday bonnet by the strings and looking up maliciously--"perhaps I shall see some one I like better than you, and not come back at all." "Hush!" he cries, hurriedly, putting up his hand before her mouth. "Don't say that; it is bad luck. I should not mind your saying it if it were not so horribly probable." Esther subsides into gravity. "I wish to Heaven you were not so fond of me!" she says, hastily; "please do try not to be: it makes me feel as if I were cheating all the time--having things and not paying for them." "I could have given you up _at first_, if you had told me it must be so positively; I'm sure I could have made shift to do without you, as I have made shift to do without many a thing that other fellows consider necessaries of life; but now----" He has seized her two hands, and now holds her standing there before him. To hold her hand is the one familiarity Robert is permitted; not once in all his life has he kissed his betrothed. "It was a foolish, silly custom," she said one day, pettishly--"no sensibler than rubbing noses together, as the Feejee islanders did; for her part, she hated it, &c." "But now, what? finish your sentence, please," says the little captive, gaily. "Esther, I wish these people had not got a son." "What people?" "These Gerards." "Why so? Do you think that they would have left you their money if they had not?" "No, not that," smiling against his will. "But, Essie, you'll promise to write and tell me what he is like?" "Yes." "What sort of age?" "Yes." "Whether you see much of him?" "Yes." "What he says to you?" "Come, I cannot promise that," says Esther, bursting out laughing. "Oh you dear old goose! are you jealous of a name, a shade, an imagination?" "I _am_ jealous," he answers, reddening. "I can no more help it than a man in the gout can help having twinges. I shall always be jealous until you are really mine past stealing or taking back again: after that I never shall." "I should hope not," retorts she, with levity: "if you were, I should think it my duty to try and give you some cause."