IX.
A DRAMA WITH TWO SPECTATORS.
The words of Bott lingered obstinately in Maud Matchin's mind. She gave
herself no rest from dwelling on them. Her imagination was full, day
after day, of glowing pictures of herself and Farnham in tete-a-tete;
she would seek in a thousand ways to tell her love--but she could never
quite arrange her avowal in a satisfactory manner. Long before she came
to the decisive words which were to kindle his heart to flame in the
imaginary dialogue, he would himself take fire by spontaneous
combustion, and, falling on his knees, would offer his hand, his heart,
and his fortune to her in words taken from "The Earl's Daughter" or the
"Heir of Ashby."
"Oh, pshaw! that's the way it ought to be," she would say to herself.
"But if he won't--I wonder whether I ever could have the brass to do
it? I don't know why I shouldn't. We are both human. Bott wouldn't have
said that if there was nothing in it, and he's a mighty smart man."
The night usually gave her courage. Gazing into her glass, she saw
enough to inspire her with an idea of her own invincibility; and after
she had grown warm in bed she would doze away, resolving with a stout
heart that she would try her fate in the morning.
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