She
forced him downstairs by a series of maneuvers which rendered his
refuge uninhabitable, and then pretended to fall violently in
love with him. She slipped little pink three-cornered notes under
his door, entreating him to make appointments with her, or
tenderly inquiring how he would like to see her hair dressed at
dinner on that day. She followed him into the garden, sometimes
to ask for the privilege of smelling his tobacco-smoke, sometimes
to beg for a lock of his hair, or a fragment of his ragged old
dressing-gown, to put among her keepsakes. She sighed at him when
he was in a passion, and put her handkerchief to her eyes when he
was sulky. In short, she tormented Morgan, whenever she could
catch him, with such ingenious and such relentless malice, that
he actually threatened to go back to London, and prey once more,
in the unscrupulous character of a doctor, on the credulity of
mankind.
Thus situated in her relations toward ourselves, and thus
occupied by country diversions of her own choosing, Miss Jessie
passed her time at The Glen Tower, excepting now and then a dull
hour in the long evenings, to her guardian's satisfaction--and,
all things considered, not without pleasure to herself. Day
followed day in calm and smooth succession, and five quiet weeks
had elapsed out of the six during which her stay was to last
without any remarkable occurrence to distinguish them, when an
event happened which personally affected me in a very serious
manner, and which suddenly caused our handsome Queen of Hearts to
become the object of my deepest anxiety in the present, and of my
dearest hopes for the future.
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