There was no need of having a scene, hardly any need
of telling Amy that he loved her, she knew it without
words and had given him his answer long ago.
It all came about so naturally that no one could complain,
and he knew that everybody would be pleased, even
Jo. But when our first little passion has been
crushed, we are apt to be wary and slow in making
a second trial, so Laurie let the days pass, enjoying
every hour, and leaving to chance the utterance of
the word that would put an end to the first and sweetest
part of his new romance.
He had rather imagined that the denoument would take
place in the chateau garden by moonlight, and in the
most graceful and decorous manner, but it turned out
exactly the reverse, for the matter was settled on
the lake at noonday in a few blunt words. They
had been floating about all the morning, from gloomy
St. Gingolf to sunny Montreux, with the Alps of Savoy
on one side, Mont St. Bernard and the Dent du Midi
on the other, pretty Vevay in the valley, and Lausanne
upon the hill beyond, a cloudless blue sky overhead,
and the bluer lake below, dotted with the picturesque
boats that look like white-winged gulls.
They had been talking of Bonnivard, as they glided
past Chillon, and of Rousseau, as they looked up at
Clarens, where he wrote his Heloise. Neither
had read it, but they knew it was a love story, and
each privately wondered if it was half as interesting
as their own. Amy had been dabbling her hand
in the water during the little pause that fell between
them, and when she looked up, Laurie was leaning on
his oars with an expression in his eyes that made
her say hastily, merely for the sake of saying something
. . .
“You must be tired. Rest a little, and
let me row. It will do me good, for since you
came I have been altogether lazy and luxurious.”
“I’m not tired, but you may take an oar,
if you like. There’s room enough, though
I have to sit nearly in the middle, else the boat
won’t trim,” returned Laurie, as if he
rather liked the arrangement.
Feeling that she had not mended matters much, Amy
took the offered third of a seat, shook her hair over
her face, and accepted an oar. She rowed as
well as she did many other things, and though she
used both hands, and Laurie but one, the oars kept
time, and the boat went smoothly through the water.
“How well we pull together, don’t we?”
said Amy, who objected to silence just then.
“So well that I wish we might always pull in
the same boat. Will you, Amy?” very tenderly.
“Yes, Laurie,” very low.
Then they both stopped rowing, and unconsciously added
a pretty little tableau of human love and happiness
to the dissolving views reflected in the lake.
