I'll send him to you soon."
Stephen was ashamed of the gladness with which he could not help hearing
this proposal. He had nothing to say to the girl which he might not say
before Nevill, or even before Lady MacGregor, yet he had been feeling
cheated because he could not be alone with Victoria, as on the boat.
"Gather Miss Ray as many lilies as she can carry away," were Nevill's
parting instructions. And it was exactly what Stephen had wished for. He
wanted to give her something beautiful and appropriate, something he
could give with his own hands. And he longed to see her holding masses
of white lilies to her breast, as she walked all white in the white
lily-garden. Now, too, he could tell her what Mademoiselle Soubise had
said about the Kabyle girl, Mouni. He was sure Nevill wouldn't grudge
his having that pleasure all to himself. Anyway he could not resist the
temptation to snatch it.
He began, as soon as they were alone together in the garden, by asking
her what she had done, whether she had made progress; and it seemed that
she retired from his questions with a vague suggestion of reserve she
had not shown on the ship. It was not that she answered unwillingly, but
he could not define the difference in her manner, although he felt that
a difference existed.
It was as if somebody might have been scolding her for a lack of
reserve; yet when he inquired if she had met any one she knew, or made
acquaintances, she said no to the first question, and named only
Mademoiselle Soubise in reply to the second.
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