I Forbid the Banns! — page 355: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

ON THE MOMENT AFTER THE PLUNGE. 345 ‘Goodness knows ; they must have gone off by another door. You are quite right, this place is stifling.” She rose and hastened to the door. He laughed, but the impression which his laugh con- veyed was exactly the same as that produced by a sob. . “There is nothing stifling in my palm nook,” said he. “Put your hand on my arm. What, can you not trust me?” he whispered, with a reproachful glance. He flat- tered himself that he was becoming more of an artistic success every moment. “Trust you?” said she. “ Alas, it is not you whom I can- not trust.”’ “Tam glad of that,” he murmured. ‘“ You are right. Oh, those days which we had together on the Flats, with Table Mountain in the distance !”’ They had descended. A glance assured him that, as he had anticipated, the ill-treated lady and her comforting youth had disappeared from the seat among the palms. There were much more secluded nooks upstairs where the guests rarely ventured. The ill-treated lady was, however, adventurous. “Could anything be more grateful or gracious?” said Julian, as Marian sank into the embrace of the great satin cushions, catching a glimpse at the same instant of the point of a fan projecting beyond the gilt edge of a Louis Seize screen a few yards behind where Julian was standing. Above the screen, toward a Seaforth palm and beneath its fronds, there was, she knew, a seat. She had often seen and coveted that fan. Even now, catching a glimpse of the top of it, her thought was: “Tt might have been mine if the steamer had not called at St. Helena.”’ “Ts the nook less entrancing than I painted it?” asked Julian. (CORNIECLIOOKS (¢(0)