"I ought to have reached you sooner, sweet love, but the waves tossed me about so that I thought I should never find the shore. Had I known you were lying here, I should have leaped into the river to reach you sooner." "How good of you, Gilbert; and you will always come to me?" she answered, softly. "Yes, Constance, and you know why. Because I love you, love you, love you, dearest, above everything on earth, and always have and will; and you, Constance, say that you love me, for this you have never done." "You know I love you, Gilbert," she answered, after a while, clinging closer about my neck; "and if you did not love me as you do, I should not want to live. I love you above everything, and you are in my thoughts day and night, you sweet boy"; and with that she took my face in her hands and drawing me to her kissed me many times. "I am always thinking of you, too, dearest, and of what you do and say, and how you look and what will please you. Now I can’t tell you how happy I am to hear you say you love me," I cried, covering her face and hair with my kisses, happy beyond anything I had ever dreamed of. Thus we plighted our troth beneath the great tree, not thinking where we were, nor caring for the storm, which now, indeed, was fast dying away. Soon, however, and as if startled out of herself, she sprang up. "Oh, Gilbert, I can never forgive myself, to have forgotten what I came for in the happiness of being with you. Quick—come with me," she cried, saying which, she grasped my hand and drew me toward the forest. "Why, what is it, Constance? I have never thought to ask what brought you here." "Nor I to tell you, Gilbert; but yesterday, papa and I going into the country, and night coming on, we thought to return by the other ferry; but reaching it, some accident to the boat prevented our crossing, and so we had to retrace our steps, and the night and the storm coming on, our horse strayed from the road, throwing us into the ditch. When I found papa he lay like one dead, nor could I bring him to, and after striving for a long time in vain, I at last thought to come here for help." "Oh, you sweet love, to be in such distress and I not know it!" I cried, lifting her arm and kissing the sleeve of her dress. "Yes; but we must make greater haste," she answered, hurrying forward. "Is it far?" I asked, that I might hear her sweet voice. "I don’t know; the way seemed long, but I was frightened and often strayed from the road." "No one but you would have had such courage, my brave little wife, for that you will be some day, sweetheart."