"I have no right to ask you who he is," he muttered, striving to control
himself.

"Nay, but, Peter, I will tell you. It is my father--what other man
should I love?"

"Margaret!" he said in wrath, "you are fooling me."

"How so? What other man should I love--unless, indeed, it were
yourself?"

"I can bear no more of this play," he said. "Mistress Margaret, I bid
you farewell. God go with you!" And he brushed past her.

"Peter," she said when he had gone a few yards, "would you have these
violets as a farewell gift?"

He turned and hesitated.

"Come, then, and take them."

So back he came, and with little trembling fingers she began to fasten
the flowers to his doublet, bending ever nearer as she fastened, until
her breath played upon his face, and her hair brushed his bonnet. Then,
it matters not how, once more the violets fell to earth, and she sighed,
and her hands fell also, and he put his strong arms round her and drew
her to him and kissed her again and yet again on the hair and eyes and
lips; nor did Margaret forbid him.