"No!" cried Gibson, springing across my path. "Miss Gertrude, I ask your pardon It would break my heart to leave this place. But ... good God, this is too hard for me to bear!" "Speak less loudly," I said. "Now, tell me. Is it about Susan?" He bent his head. "You mean," I said, "you’ve fallen in love with Susan." And then, although my spirit was quailing and failing at the desperate sight of the poor lad’s agony, I actually forced myself to try and laugh him out of it, as if it had been no more than a mild attack of calf-love. "Really, Gibson," I said, as banteringly and gaily as I could, "I’m surprised at you. You’re behaving as if Susan’s going to Siberia for life instead of to France for a month. No doubt it’s very painful and upsetting to be head over ears in love, though I confess I don’t know much about it. But surely, Gibson, you can manage to exist without seeing Susan for four little weeks? Be more of a man." "It’s because I’m a man, Ma’am," he rejoined firmly, "that my right place is at Sinn Veeronik. You talk of four little weeks, Ma’am. When them four little weeks are over, shall I see the same Susan as went away?" His earnestness was so terrible that I could not maintain my hollow banter, and I was silent. "I put it plain, Ma’am. When them four little weeks are over, shall I ever see Susan any more?" I couldn’t answer. Worse still, I guessed that his next move would be to ask me how much I knew. So I clung fast to the one hope that buoys me up in all this outrageous business--the hope that Time and Separation will restore Lord Ruddington to such senses as he may possess, and that Susan, like a ruffled dove, will home back to Gibson’s faithful heart after all. "You can’t answer, Ma’am," he said almost fiercely. "Of course I can’t, you foolish fellow," I said, recovering my wits and making a show of irritation. "I can’t answer for Susan any more than I can for you. How do I know that, when we come back in four weeks’ time, poor Susan won’t find you consoling yourself with somebody else?" He brushed my trifling aside. "Then I’ll tell you, Ma’am, something you don’t know," he almost hissed in my ear. "God knows who it is: but some one’s turned Susan’s head. She doesn’t do no more than give me hints. It’s driving me mad. She doesn’t name the party: but it’s somebody richer’n a lord." Gibson flung down his cap and lifted his right hand. "Hark ye, Miss Gertrude," he said harshly and chokily. "Hark ye while I swear. This is my Bible oath. If he touches a hair on Susan’s head, saving what’s honest, I’ll break every bone in his body! Don’t matter to me if it’s the king himself. Whoever he is, I’ll wring his neck, and swing for it gladly. If I don’t, may I be struck dead!" "Silence, Gibson!" I said sternly. "Don’t speak like this to me."