No doubt they might make a very pretty bargain between
them; he might go to her and say,
"Let there be a sacrifice on both sides. I give up the theatre--I give
up the applause, the popularity, the opportunities of making pleasant
friendships--all the agreeable things of a stage-life; and you on your
part give up your pride of birth, and, it may be, something of your
place in society. It is a surrender on both sides. Let our motto be,
'All for love, and the world well lost.'" Yes, a very pretty bargain;
but as he considered that he was now wandering into the region of
romance--a region which he unhesitatingly scorned as having no relation
with the facts of the world--he withdrew from that futile and useless
and idle speculation, and took to thinking of Miss Honnor Cunyngham as
she actually was, and wondering over which of the Aivron pools the
proud-featured fisher-maiden would be casting at this moment.
And here, again, as the hours crept by, was something of a more
practical nature to remind him of the now far-distant strath. In order
to save him from the hurry of a twenty-minutes' railway-station dinner,
Lady Adela had ordered a luncheon-basket to be packed for him, and her
skill and forethought in this direction were unequalled, as many a
little shooting-party had joyfully discovered.
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