she had gone to be captured by Bucklaw--she had misgivings. If she had
been asked whether she loved Iberville, she might have answered no. But
he was a possible lover; and every woman weighs the possible lover
against the accepted one--often, at first, to fluttering apprehensions.
In this brief reaction many a woman's heart has been caught away.

A few days after Gering's arrival he was obliged to push on to Boston,
there to meet Phips. He hoped that Mr. Leveret and Jessica would
accompany him, but Governor Nicholls would not hear of it just yet.
Truth is, wherever the girl went she was light and cheerfulness, although
her ways were quiet and her sprightliness was mostly in her looks. She
was impulsive, but impulse was ruled by a reserve at once delicate and
unembarrassed. She was as much beloved in the town of New York as in
Boston.

Two days after Gering left she was wandering in the garden, when the
governor joined her.

"Well, well, my pretty councillor," he said--"an hour to cheer an old
man's leisure?"

"As many as you please," she answered daintily, putting her hand within
his arm. "I am so very cheerful I need to shower the surplus." There
was a smile at her lips, but her eyes were misty. Large, brilliant,
gentle, they had now also a bewildered look, which even the rough old
soldier saw. He did not understand, but he drew the hand further within
his arm and held it, there, and for the instant he knew not what to say.
The girl did not speak; she only kept looking at him with a kind of
inward smiling. Presently, as if he had suddenly lighted upon a piece of
news for the difficulty, he said: "Radisson has come."