He had helped her out and stood holding her hand as one old enough to be her father. He smiled and, looking down at her glowing face, and hair, and neck, repeated:
"What thou art we know not. What is most like thee? From rainbow clouds there flow not Drops so bright to see As from thy presence showers a rain of melody."
Then he changed as she thanked him, and said: "When you go into the mill I shall have many pleasant surprises for you like this."
He bent over her and whispered: "I have arranged for your pay to be double--we are neighbors, you know--your father and I,--and a pretty girl, like you, need not work always."
The color went from her cheeks. Then it came again in a crimson tide, so full and rich, that Richard Travis, like Titian with his brush, stood spellbound before the work he had done.
Fearing he had said too much, he dropped his voice and with a twinkle in his eye said:
All her timidity vanished--her hanging of the head, her silence, her blushes. Instead, there leaped into her eyes that light which Richard Travis had never seen before--the light of a Conway on mettle.
"I do not blame you," he said. "I shall be a--father to you if you will let me."
He pressed her hand, and raising his hat, was gone.
As he drove away he turned and looked at her slipping across the lawn in the twilight. In his eyes was a look of triumphant excitement.
"To own her--such a creature--God--it were worth risking my neck."
The mention of Harry brought back all her bitter recklessness to Helen. She was but a child and her road, indeed, was hard. And as she turned at the old gate and looked back at the vanishing buggy she said:
"Had he asked me this evening I'd--yes--I'd go to the end of the world with him. I'd go--go--go--and I care not how."
Richard Travis was in a jolly mood at the supper table that night, and Harry became jolly also, impertinently so. He had not said a word about his cousin being with Helen, but it burned in his breast, and he awaited his chance to mention it.
"I have thought up a fable since I have been at supper, Cousin Richard. Shall I tell you?"
"Well," began Harry unabashed, and with many sly winks and much histrionic effort, "it is called the 'Fox and the Lion.' Now a fox in the pursuit ran down a beautiful young doe and was about to devour her when the lion came up and with a roar and a sweep of his paw, took her saying...."