Let no one suppose that in their delivery these words brought with them
sorrow. I had been walking with my usual dancing motion, and it is
true, that when David spoke, I stood still, faced round, and gazed at
him earnestly, it is also true that the colour left my cheeks, and my
eyes filled with tears, but my emotions were pleasurable, my tears were
tears of joy.
Owen coming home!
Nobody quite knew how I loved Owen, how _my_ heart had longed for him,
how many castles in the air I had built, with him for their hero.
In all possible and impossible dreams of my own future, Owen had figured
as the grand central thought. Owen would show me the world, Owen would
let me live with him. He had promised me this when I was a little
child, and he was a fine noble-looking youth, and I had believed him, I
believed him still. I had longed and yearned for him, I had never
forgotten him. My love for my good and sober brother David was very
calm and sisterly, but my love for Owen was the romance of my existence.
And now he was coming home, crowned with laurels, doubtless. For he
had been away so long, he had left us so suddenly and mysteriously, that
only could his absence be accounted for by supposing that my beautiful
and noble brother had gone on some very great, and important, and
dangerous mission, from which he would return now, crowned with honour
and glory.
"Oh, David!" I exclaimed, when I could find my voice, "is it true? How
very, very happy I am."
"Yes, Gwladys," replied David, "it is true; but let us walk up and down
this path, it is quite quiet here, and I have a story to tell you about
Owen."
"How glad I am," I repeated, "I love him more than any one, and I quite
knew how it would be, I always guessed it, I knew he would come back
covered with glory. Yes, David, go on, tell me quickly, what did my
darling do?"
I was rather impatient, and I wondered why David did not reply more
joyfully, why, indeed, at first he did not speak at all. I could see no
reason for his silence, the crowds of men and women who had filled the
cathedral had dispersed, had wandered to hotels for refreshment, or gone
to explore, if strangers, the beauties and antiquities the old town
possessed. There was no one to molest or disturb us, as we walked up
and down in this quiet part of the Close.
"Well, David," I said, "go on, tell me about my darling."
"Yes," said David, "I will tell you, but I have got something else to
say first."
"What?" I asked, impatiently.
"This; you have made a mistake about Owen, you imagine him to be what he
is not."
"What do I imagine him to be?" I asked, angrily, for David's tone put
into my heart the falsest idea it ever entertained--namely, that he was
jealous of my greater love for Owen.
"What do I imagine?" I asked.
"You imagine that Owen is a hero. Now, Gwladys, you cannot love Owen
too much, nor ever show your love to him too much, but you can do him no
good whatever, if you start with a false idea of him."