So when I learned that she was off again with him, such a rage and wretchedness possessed me that I knew not what to do. Common sense yelled in my ear that no man of that stripe could seriously impress her; but where is the understanding in a very young man so violently sick with love as was I? All men who approached her I instantly suspected and mentally damned--even honest old Simpson--aye, even Major Parr himself. And I wonder now I had not done something to invite court-martial. For my common sense had been abruptly and completely upset, and I was at that period in a truly unhappy and contemptible plight.
I could not seem to steer my footsteps clear of the river bank, nor deny myself the fierce and melancholy pleasure of gazing at their canoe from afar, so I finally walked in that direction, cursing my own weakness and meditating quarrels and fatal duels.
But when I arrived on the river bank, I could not discover her in any of the canoes that danced in the rosy ripples of the declining sun. So, mooning and miserable, I lagged along the bank toward my bush-hut; and presently, to my sudden surprise, discovered the very lady of whom I had been thinking so intently--not dogged as usual by that insufferable Ensign, but in earnest conversation with the Sagamore.
And, as I gazed at them outlined against the evening sky, I remembered what Betsy Hunt had said at Poundridge--how she had encountered them together on the hill which overlooked the Sound.
Long before I reached them or they had discovered me, the Sagamore turned and took his departure, with a dignified gesture of refusal; and Lois looked after him for a moment, her hand to her cheek, then turned and gazed straight into the smouldering West, where, stretching away under its million giant pines, the vast empire of the Long House lay, slowly darkening against the crimson sunset.
She did not notice me as I came toward her through the waving Indian grass, and even when I spoke her name she did not seem startled, but turned very deliberately, her eyes still reflecting the brooding thoughts that immersed her.
"What is it that you and this Mohican have still to say to each other?" I asked apprehensively.
The vague expression of her features changed; she answered with heightened colour: