"I thought just now that - that it was the end!" she said, and shivered. "And at such times," I added, "one sometimes says things one wouldnot have said under ordinary circumstances.My dear, I quite understand- quite, and I'll try to forget - you needn't fear.""Do you think you can?" she asked, turning to look at me.
"I can but try," I answered. Now as I spoke I wasn't sure, but I thought I saw the pale ghost of the dimple by her mouth.
We walked back side by side along the river-path, very silently, for the most part, yet more than once I caught her regarding me covertly and with a puzzled air.
"Well?" I said at last, tentatively.
"I was wondering why you did it, Dick? Oh, ii was mean! cruel! wicked! How could you ?""Oh, well"-and I shrugged my shoulders, anathematising the Imp mentally the while.
"If I hadn't noticed that the rope was freshly cut, I should have thought it an accident," she went on.""Naturally!" I said."
"And then, again, how came you in the boat?"" "To be sure!" I nodded."Still, I can scarcely believe that you would willfully jeopardise both our lives - my life!""A man who would do such a thing," I exclaimed, carried away by the heat of the moment, "would be a - a - ""Yes," said Lisbeth quickly, "he would."
" -And utterly beyond the pale of all forgiveness!" "Yes," said Lisbeth, "of course.""And," I was beginning again, but meeting her searching glance, stopped. "And you forgave me, Lisbeth," I ended.
"Did I?" she said, with raised brows. "Didn't you?""Not that I remember." "In the boat?"
"I never said so?"
"Not in words, perhaps, but you implied as much." Lisbeth had the grace to blush.
"Do I understand that I am not forgiven after all?""Not until I know why you did such a mad, thoughtless trick," she answered, with that determined set of her chin which I knew so well.
That I should thus shoulder the responsibility for the Imp's misdeeds was ridiculous, and wrong as it was unjust, for if ever boy deserved punishment that boy was the Imp. And yet, probably because he was the Imp, or because of that school-boy honour which forbids "sneaking," and which I carried with me still, I held my peace; seeing which, Lisbeth turned and left me.
I stood where I was, with head bent in an attitude suggestive of innocence, broken hopes, and gentle resignation, but in vain; she never once looked back. Still, martyr though I was, the knowledge that I had immolated myself upon the altar of friendship filled me with a sense of conscious virtue that I found not ill-pleasing. Howbeit, seeing I am but human after all, I sat down and re-filling my pipe, fell once more anathematising the Imp.
"Hist!"
A small shape flittered from behind an adjacent tree, and lo! the subject of my thoughts stood before me.
Imp' I said "come here." He obeyed readily. "When you cut that rope and set your Auntie Lisbeth adrift, you didn't remember the man whowas drowned in the weir last month, did you?" "No!" he answered, staring.
"Of course not," I nodded; "but all the same it is not your fault that your Auntie Lisbeth is not drowned - just as he was,""Oh!" exclaimed the Imp, and his beloved bow slipped from his nerveless fingers.
"Imp," I went on, "it was a wicked thing to cut that rope, a mean, cruel trick, Don't you think so?""I 'specks it was, Uncle Dick."
"Don't you think you ought to be punished?" He nodded. "Very well," I answered, "I'll punish you myself. Go and cut me a nice, straight switch," and I handed him my open penknife. Round-eyed, the Imp obeyed, and for a space there was a prodigious cracking and snapping of sticks. In a little while he returned with three, also the blade of my knife was broken, for which he was profusely apologetic.
