"No, I am not a boy. I sometimes fancy I never was a boy--I came here a
child." And then, "I think you like to tease me, Leila," and this was
true, although she was not pleased to be told so. "You think, Leila, that
it teases me to be called a boy by your ladyship. I think it is because
you remember what a boy once said to you here--right here."

"What do you mean?" She knew very well what he meant, but quickly
repenting of her feminine fib, said, "Oh, I do know, but I wanted to
forget--I wanted to pretend to forget, because you know what friends we
have been, and it was really so foolish."

He had been lying at her feet; now he rose slowly. "You are not like my
Leila to-day."

"Oh, John!"

"No--and it is hard, because I am going away--and--it will not be
pleasant to think how you are changed."

"I wish you wouldn't say such things to me, John."

"I had to--because--I love you. If I was a boy when I was, as you say,
silly, I was in earnest. It was nonsense to ask you, to say you would
marry me some day. It wasn't so very long ago after all; but I agree with
you, it _was_ foolish. Now I mean to make no such proposal."

"Please, John." She looked up at him as he stood over her so grave, so
earnest--and so like Uncle Jim. For the time she got the fleeting
impression of this being a man.