Toil too was beginning to disfigure her small hands,
which, if left idle, would have become charmingly plump and delicate.
Miette and Silvere long remained silent. They were reading their own
anxious thoughts, and, as they pondered upon the unknown terrors of the
morrow, they tightened their mutual embrace. Their hearts communed with
each other, they understood how useless and cruel would be any verbal
plaint. The girl, however, could at last no longer contain herself,
and, choking with emotion, she gave expression, in one phrase, to their
mutual misgivings.
"You will come back again, won't you?" she whispered, as she hung on
Silvere's neck.
Silvere made no reply, but, half-stifling, and fearing lest he should
give way to tears like herself, he kissed her in brotherly fashion
on the cheek, at a loss for any other consolation. Then disengaging
themselves they again lapsed into silence.
After a moment Miette shuddered. Now that she no longer leant against
Silvere's shoulder she was becoming icy cold. Yet she would not have
shuddered thus had she been in this deserted path the previous evening,
seated on this tombstone, where for several seasons they had tasted so
much happiness.
"I'm very cold," she said, as she pulled her hood over her head.
"Shall we walk about a little?" the young man asked her. "It's not yet
nine o'clock; we can take a stroll along the road."
Miette reflected that for a long time she would probably not have the
pleasure of another meeting--another of those evening chats, the joy of
which served to sustain her all day long.
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