"
Mrs. Corfield and Alick were sitting in the "work-room" on the morning
of the fifth day after the marriage, when the thought struck the
little woman of the propriety of Leam's visit to them for the month of
her father's absence. She did not see her son's face when she spoke,
being busy with her wood-carving. If she had, she would not have
thought that the presence of Leam Dundas would bore or annoy him. The
clumsy features gladdened into smiles, the dull eye brightened, the
dim complexion flushed: if ever a face expressed supreme delight,
Alick's did then; and it expressed what he felt, for, as we know, the
one love of his boyish life was this girl-queen of his fancy. Not that
he was in love with her in the ordinary sense of being in love. He
was too reverent and she too young for vulgar passion or commonplace
sentiment. She was something precious to his imagination, not his
senses, like a child-queen to her courtier, a high-born lady to her
page. He bore with her girlish temper, her girlish insolence of pride,
her ignorant opposition, with the humility of strength bending its
neck to weakness--the devotion and unselfish sweetness characteristic
of him in other of his relations than those with Leam.
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