doubt and partly shrewd scrutiny.
"I plucked the bud all the same," he remarked. Cornelia, for some reason, felt a little provoked and a little frightened. He wasn't entirely unsophisticated after all; and she felt quite uncertain where the ignorance ended and the knowledge began. She put the bud in her hair, and they walked on, Bressant being now at her side, instead of behind. The path was hardly wide enough for two, and now and then she felt her shoulder touch his arm. Every time this happened, she fancied her companion gave a kind of involuntary start, and looked around at her with a quick, inquiring expression--fancied, for she did not meet his look, being herself conscious of a sort of irregularity of the breath and pulse attending these contacts, which she could not understand, and did not feel altogether at ease about. Certainly, there was something odd in this Bressant! Cornelia hardly knew whether he strongly repelled or powerfully attracted her. She had half a mind to run back to the house.
At this moment, however, they arrived at the fountain, and stood silently contemplating its weak, persistent struggles. The heavy rain had not raised its spirits a whit; but neither had it lessened its sense of duty to be performed. It labored just as hard if not harder than ever.
Presently Bressant walked round to the opposite side of the basin, shook himself and stamped his feet, like one overcoming a feeling of drowsiness, and then, stooping down, put his hand in the water and brought some up to his forehead. It passed through Cornelia's mind that she had read in her "Natural Philosophy," at school, that water was a good conductor of electricity, but she could not establish any clear connection between her remembrance of this fact and Bressant's action. The results of thoughts often present themselves to us when the processes remain invisible.
"What an absurd little fountain!" observed he, coming round again to Cornelia, and looking down upon her with a smile that seemed to call for a responsive one from her. "What is the use of it?"
"Oh, we're used to it, you know; and then that little sound it makes is pleasant to listen to."
"Is it?" said Bressant, apparently struck by the idea. "I should like to hear it. 'A pleasant sound!' I never thought of a sound being pleasant."
"Poor fellow!" thought Cornelia again, with a strong impulse of compassion and kindliness. "What a dreary life, not even to know that sounds were beautiful! I suppose all the voices he hears must be harsh and unnatural, and those are the only kinds of sounds he would attend to." Looking at him from this new point of view, the feeling of mistrust and uncertainty of a few minutes before was forgotten. Standing near the margin of the basin was a rustic bench fantastically made of curved and knotted branches, the back and arms contrived in rude scroll-work, and the seat made of round transverse pieces, through whose interstices the rain-water had passed, leaving it comparatively dry. Cornelia sat down upon it and motioned Bressant to take his place by her side. As he did so, she could not help a slight thrill of dismay. He was so very big, and took up so much room!
Bressant sat looking straight before him, and said nothing. Stealing a side-glance at him, Cornelia was possessed by an absurd fancy that he was alarmed at his position. The idea of being able to scare such a giant excited the young lady's risibilities so powerfully that she could not contain herself, but, to her great horror, broke suddenly forth into a warbling ecstasy of laughter. Bressant looked around, in great surprise. It was an occasion for presence of mind. Something must be done at once.
"Hush! hold perfectly still! It was so absurd to see you sitting there, and not knowing! There--now--still!" _Spat!_
A mosquito, which, after considerable reconnoitring, had settled upon Bressant's broad hand, had sacrificed its life to rescue Cornelia from her dilemma.
Bressant felt the soft, warm fingers strike smartly, and then begin to remove, cautiously and slowly, because the mosquito was possibly not dead after all. What was the matter with the young man? His blood and senses seemed to quiver and tingle with a sensation at once delicious and confusing. In the same instant, he had seized the soft, warm fingers in both his hands, and pressed them convulsively and almost fiercely. Cornelia very naturally cried out, and sprang to her feet. Bressant, it would seem not so naturally, did the same thing, and with the air of being to the full as much astonished and startled as she.
"What do you mean, sir? how dare you--?" she said, paling after her first deep flush.
He looked at her, and then at his own hand, on which the accommodating mosquito was artistically flattened, and then at her again, with a slight, interrogative frown.
"How did it happen? What was it? I didn't mean it!"
Cornelia was quite at a loss what to do or say under such extraordinary circumstances. She felt short of breath and indignant; but she had never heard of a young man's questioning a lady as to how he had come to take a liberty with her. As she stood thus confounded, her unfortunate perception of the ludicrous betrayed her once more; but this time her recent shock played a part in it, and came very near producing a bad fit of hysterics. Bressant looked on without a word or a motion.
In less than a minute, for Cornelia's nerves were very strong, and had never been overtaxed, she had regained command of herself. Bressant was standing between her and the house, and she pointed up the path.
"Please go home as quickly as possible."
Off he walked, with every symptom of readiness and relief. Cornelia followed after, but, when she reached the house, she found her papa staring inquiringly out of his study-door; the uncanny pupil in divinity had disappeared.
CHAPTER VI.
CORNELIA BEGINS TO UNDO A KNOT.
Bressant, to do him justice--for he was, on the whole, rather apt to be polite than otherwise, in his way--entirely forgot the professor's existence for the time being. He was too self-absorbed to think of other people. He thought he was bewitched, and felt a strong and healthy impulse to throw off the witchery before doing any thing else. He sprang up the steps, across the balcony, traversed the hall with a quick tramp that shook the house, snatched his hat from the old hat-tree, came down upon the porch-step (which creaked in a paroxysm of reproach at his unaccustomed weight), and, in another moment, stood outside the Parsonage-gate, which, to save time, he had leaped, instead of opening.
The road was white no longer, but brown and moist. The sky overhead was deep purple, and full of stars. The air wafted about hither and thither in little, cool, damp puffs, which were a luxury to inhale. Bressant drew in two or three long lungfuls; then, setting his round straw hat more firmly on his head, he leaned slightly forward, and launched himself into a long, swinging run.
To run gracefully and well is a rare accomplishment, for it demands a particularly well-adjusted physical organization, great strength, and a deep breath-reservoir. Bressant's body poised itself lightly between the hips, and swayed slightly, but easily, from side to side at each spring. The knees alternately caught the weight without swerving, and shifted it, with an elastic toss, from one to the other. The feet came down sharp and firm, and springily spurned the road in a rapid though rhythmical succession. In a few moments, the turn around the spur of the hill was reached, and the runner was well settled down to his pace.
The stone-fences, the occasional apple-trees, the bushes and bits of rock bordering the road, slipped by half seen. The full use of the eyes was required for the path in front, rough as it was with loose stones, and seamed with irregular ruts. Easy work enough, however, as long as it remained level, and open to the starlight. But, some distance beyond, there dipped a pretty abrupt slope, and here was need for care and quickness. Sometimes a step fell short, or struck
