Perversity, thy name is
maidenhood; and maidenhood, thy name is delicious inconsequence!
When Alice heard that Beverley had come back, safe, victorious, to
be greeted as one of the heroes of an important adventure, she
immediately ran to her room frightened and full of vague, shadowy
dread, to hide from him, yet feeling sure that he would not come!
Moreover, she busied herself with the preposterous task of putting
on her most attractive gown--the buff brocade which she wore that
evening at the river house--how long ago it seemed!--when Beverley
thought her the queenliest beauty in the world. And she was
putting it on so as to look her prettiest while hiding from him!
It is a toss-up where happiness will make its nest. The palace,
the hut, the great lady's garden, the wild lass's bower,--skip
here, alight there,--the secret of it may never be told. And love
and beauty find lodgment, by the same inexplicable route, in the
same extremes of circumstances. The wind bloweth where it listeth,
finding many a matchless flower and many a ravishing fragrance in
the wildest nooks of the world.
No sooner did Beverley land at the little wharf than, rushing to
his quarters, he made a hasty exchange of water-soaked apparel for
something more comfortable, and then bolted in the direction of
Roussillon place.
Now Alice knew by the beating of her heart that he was coming.
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