"Madam," said Charles at length with a deep breath, as if he were putting from him an unwelcome thought; "Madam, you were doubtless surprised to find me walking with Miss Anna in this somewhat lonely part of the garden--"
"Walking with her, yes,--and kissing her," said fair Laurentia, completing the sentence.
"Well, yes," continued Charles, "and kissing her; but should you perhaps think that we had purposely selected this spot, then--"
"Well, what then?" asked she, with a sly smile.
"Then you would be misjudging Miss Anna and myself."
"I considered," retorted Laurentia, somewhat sarcastically, "that the spot was an admirable one--well-chosen for kissing."
"Yet it was the merest chance that brought us to it. Believe me, before that moment,--or to speak more correctly,--before this evening, not a word of love had ever passed between us."
"Oh, Mr. van Nerekool!" exclaimed Laurentia, with a mocking smile, "that is quite incredible! Do you expect me to believe that two young people of different sexes, should be kissing each other in an out-of-the-way corner, if there had not previously been some words of affection,--of love,--spoken between them--without, in fact, any question of passion on either side?"
"And yet, madam, believe me, it is the perfect truth. I never tell a lie," broke in Charles, with considerable vehemence.
"Aye, aye," said Laurentia, "I know all about it. I once was young myself. Oh," continued the pleasure-loving woman, her voice falling at the remembrance of that youth from which she was so loth to part. "Oh, when I was nineteen, I was exactly what Anna is now--I was, as she is now, a budding beauty, I had just as fresh and youthful feelings--I was just as child-like and playful as she is."
Van Nerekool shuddered at this comparison of the daughter with the mother.
"I was just as kind-hearted, just as lovable as she is. Oh believe me," continued she, excitedly, while she allowed her hand to lean on his arm more heavily perhaps than was needful, and gave that arm a gentle pressure. "Believe me, one need not have a very lively imagination to see that Anna will be precisely like me."
For a moment she paused, as if she began to see that she was being carried away by her subject.