Presently a rose flung through the window fell on her bent head.  She started up, alarmed.

“Innocent!”

Timidly she leaned out over the window-sill, looking down into the dusky green of clambering foliage, and saw a familiar face smiling up at her.  She uttered a soft cry.

“Robin!”

“Yes—­it’s Robin!” he replied.  “Innocent, what’s the matter?  I heard you crying!”

“No—­no!” she answered, whisperingly—­“It’s nothing!  Oh, Robin!—­ why are you here at this time of night?  Do go away!”

“Not I!” and Robin placed one foot firmly on the tough and gnarled branch of a giant wistaria that was trained thickly all over that side of the house—­“I’m coming up!”

“Oh, Robin!” And straightway Innocent ran back into her room, there to throw on a dark cloak which enveloped her so completely that only her small fair head showed above its enshrouding folds, —­then returning slowly she watched with mingled interest and trepidation the gradual ascent of her lover, as, like another Romeo, he ascended the natural ladder formed by the thick rope-like twisted stems of the ancient creeper, grown sturdy with years and capable of bearing a much greater weight than that of the light and agile young man, who, with a smile of amused triumph, at last brought himself on a level with the window-sill and seated himself on its projecting ledge.

“I won’t come in,” he said, mischievously—­“though I might!—­if I dared!  But I mustn’t break into my lady’s bower without her sovereign permission!  I say, Innocent, how pretty you look!  Don’t be frightened!—­dear, dear little girl,—­you know I wouldn’t touch so much as a hair of your sweet little head!  I’m not a brute—­and though I’m longing to kiss you I promise I won’t even try!”

She moved away from him into the deeper shadow, but a ray of the moon showed him her face, very pale, with a deep sadness upon it which was strange and new to him.

“Tell me what’s wrong?” he asked.  “I’ve been too wide-awake and restless to go to bed,—­so I came out in the garden just to breathe the air and look up at your window—­and I heard a sound of sobbing like that of a little child who was badly hurt—­Innocent!”

For she had suddenly stretched out her hands to him in impulsive appeal.

“Oh yes—­that’s true!—­I am badly hurt, Robin!” she said, in low trembling accents—­“So badly hurt that I think I shall never get over it!”

Surprised, he took her hands in his own with a gentle reverence, though to be able to draw her nearer to him thus, set his heart beating quickly.

“What is it?” he questioned her, anxiously, as all unconsciously she leaned closer towards him and he saw her soft eyes, wet with tears, shining upon him like stars in the gloom.  “Is it bad news of Uncle Hugo?”

“Bad news of him, but worse of me!” she answered, sighingly.  “Oh, Robin, shall I tell you?”

He looked at her tenderly.  The dark cloak about her had fallen a little aside, and showed a gleam of white neck emerging from snowy drapery underneath—­it was, to his fancy, as though a white rose-petal had been suddenly and delicately unfurled.  He longed to kiss that virginal whiteness, and trembled at the audacity of his own desire.