Day after day I lay on my trundle where I could see her. She never noticed me, though by turning her head she could have seen me where I lay. I do not now remember clearly what was my state of mind except that a dull bitterness reigned there. Which was, of course, against all common sense and decent reason. I had no claim upon this girl. I had kissed her--through no fault of hers, and by no warrant and no encouragement from her to so conduct in her regard. I had kissed her once. But other men had done that perhaps with no more warrant. And I, though convinced that the girl knew not how to parry such surprises, brooded sullenly upon mine own indiscretion with her; and pondered upon the possible behaviour of other men with her. And I silently damned their impudence, and her own imprudence which seemed to have taught her little in regard to men. But in my mind the chiefest and most sullen trouble lay in what I had seen under the lilacs that night in June. And when I closed my eyes I seemed to see her in Steve Watts' arms, and the lad's ardent embrace of her throat and hair, and the flushed passion marring his youthful face---- I often lay there, my eyes on her where I could see her through the door, knitting, and strove to remember how I had first heard her name spoken, and how at that last supper at the Hall her name was spoken and her beauty praised by such dissolute young gallants as Steve Watts and Lieutenant Hare; and how even Sir John had blurted out, in his cups, enough to betray an idle dalliance with this yellow-haired girl, and sufficient to affront his wife and his brother-in-law, and to disgust me. And Nick had said that men swarmed about her like forest-flies around a pan o' syrup! And all this, too, before ever I had laid eyes upon this slim and silent girl who now sat out yonder within my sullen vision, knitting or winding her wool in silence. What, then, could be the sentiments of any honest man concerning her? What, when I considered these things, were my own sentiments in her regard? And though report seemed clear, and what I had witnessed plainer still, I seemed to be unable to come to any conclusion as to my true sentiments in this business, or why, indeed, it was any business of mine, and why I concerned myself at all. Men found her young and soft and inexperienced; and so stole from her the kiss that heaven sent them. And Steve Watts, at least, was more wildly enamoured.... And, no doubt, that reckless flame had not left her entirely cold.... Else how could she have strolled away to meet him that same night when her lips must still have felt the touch of mine?... And how endured his passion there in the starlight?... And if she truly were a loyal friend to liberty, how in God's name give secret tryst and countenance to a spy? * * * * *