`No; my heart tells me it is not. I might have thought so once, but now, I say, give me the girl I love, and I will swear eternal constancy to her and her alone, through summer and winter, through youth and age, and life and death! if age and death must come.'
He spoke this in such serious earnest that my heart bounded with delight; but the minute after he changed his tone, and asked, with a significant smile, if I had `any more portraits.'
`No,' replied I, reddening with confusion and wrath, But my portfolio was on the table; he took it up, and coolly sat down to examine its contents.
`Mr Huntingdon, those are my unfinished sketches,' cried I, `and I never let anyone see them.'
And I placed my hand on the portfolio to wrest it from him; but he maintained his hold, assuring me that he `liked shed sketches of all things.'
`But I hate them to be seen,' returned I. `I can't let you have it, indeed!'
`Let me have its bowels then,' said he; and just as I wrenched the portfolio from his hand, he deftly abstracted the greater part of its contents, and after turning them over a moment, he cried out,--`Bless my stars, here's another!' and slipped a small oval of ivory paper into his waistcoat pocket--a complete miniature portrait, that I had sketched with such tolerable success, as to be induced to colour it with great pains and care. But I was determined he should not keep it.
`Mr Huntingdon,' cried I, `I insist upon having that back! It is mine, and you have no right to take it. Give it me, directly--I'll never forgive you, if you don't!'
But the more vehemently I insisted, the more he aggravated my distress by his insulting, gleeful laugh. At length, however, he restored it to me, saying--`Well, well, since you value it so much, I'll not deprive you of it.'
To show him how I valued it, I tore it in two, and threw it into the fire. He was not prepared for this. His merriment suddenly ceasing, he stared in mute amazement at the consuming treasure; and then, with a careless `Humph! I'll go and shoot now,' he turned on his heel, and vacated the apartment by the window as he came, and setting on his hat with an air, took up his gun and walked away, whistling as he went--and leaving me not too much agitated to finish my picture; for I was glad, at the moment, that I had vexed him.
When I returned to the drawing.room, I found Mr Boarham had ventured to follow his comrades to the field; and shortly after lunch, to which they did not think of returning, I volunteered to accompany the ladies in a walk, and show Annabella and Milicent the beauties of the country.
We took a long ramble and reentered the park just as the sportsmen were returning from their expedition. Toil-spent and travel-stained, the main body of them crossed over the grass to avoid us; but Mr Huntingdon, all spattered and splashed as he was, and stained with the blood of his prey--to the no small offence of my aunt's strict sense of propriety--came out of his way to meet us, with cheerful smiles and words for all but me, and placing himself between Annabella Wilmot and myself, walked up the road and began to relate the various exploits and disasters of the day, in a manner that would have convulsed me with laughter, if I had been on good terms with him; but he addressed himself entirely to Annabella, and I, of course, left all the laughter and all the badinage to her, and affecting the utmost indifference to Whatever passed between them, walked along a few paces apart, and looking every way but theirs; while my aunt and Milicent went before, linked arm in arm, and gravely discoursing together. At length, Mr Huntingdon turned to me, and addressing me in a confidential whisper, said--`Helen, why did you burn my picture?'