Mark
had followed you apparently some distance. So I ventured to come and
look for you, and--something led me right. But all the time I seem going
to lose myself instead of finding you."
"It might be both," returned Hester; "for I don't at all know my way
with certainty, especially in the dusk. We are on the shady side of the
hill, you see."
"I cannot have lost myself if I have found you," rejoined Vavasor, but
did not venture to carry the speech farther.
"It is time we were moving," said Hester, "seeing we are both so
uncertain of the way. Who knows when we may reach the house!"
"Do let us risk it a few minutes longer," said Vavasor. "This is
delicious. Just think a moment: this my first burst from the
dungeon-land of London for a whole year! This is paradise! I could fancy
I was dreaming of fairyland! But it is such an age since you left
London, that I fear you must be getting used to it, and will scarcely
understand my delight!"
"It is only the false fairyland of mechanical inventors," replied
Hester, "that children ever get tired of. And yet I don't know," she
added, correcting herself; "it is true the things that delight Saffy are
a contempt to Mark; but I am sorry to say the things Mark delights in,
Saffy says are so dull; there is hardly a giant in them!"
As they talked Vavasor had seated himself on the fir-spoil beside her.
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